COQ/Quebec Open Chess Championship 2019 (Saturday, July 20 – Sat., July 27/19) - Blog

[Bob Armstrong]

COQ/Quebec Open Chess Championship (Saturday, July 20 – Sat., July 27/19) - Blog

Rd. 5 – Tuesday, 19/7/23 (6:00 PM)

Bob's Chess Blog # 4 (Part III of 3 parts; see Parts I & II above)

Rd. 4

It was a long 6 ½ hr. game…it is still being entered; should be in Wednesday`s Blog # 5.

U 1800 Section Chess Report on Rd. 5 (Tuesday, July 23, 2019).

My U 1800 Section

I am rated 1633 (FQE). I am ranked # 17 out of 33 players (In the middle third).

Rating Spread

1700`s – 4 (Favourites)
1600’s – 15 (my rating is here)
1500’s – 12
1400’s – 1
1300’s – 0
1200`s - 1

Total - 33

U 1800 Standings After Rd. 4

Leaders:

1^st – 4.5/5 pts. – Geffrard Morinvil (1667)

2^nd/4^th – 4/5 pts. – Benoit Villeneuve (1762 – top seed); Guennadi Kozlov (1691); Haruaki Omichi (1674).

Favourites/Dark Horses (Non-leaders)

3.5/4 pts. –Alessio Di Matteo (1639); Dominic Boileau (1607).

3/4 pts. - Abderaouf Sekki (1740 – 2^nd seed); Maximo Alcantra Jr. (1726 – 3^rd seed); Patrice Gerard (1715 – 4^th seed); Ion Nica (1681); Ming Yu Xi (1647); Roger Gendron (1566); Junior Girl Rachel Zihan Wang (1556); Junior Boy Hugo Guillemette (1503 – 8 y.o.!)

It is my experience that Favourites/Dark Horses who may not start well, often end near the top…… 4 more rounds to go……a long tournament…….a lot can happen!!
We`ll watch all 10 for the final few rounds, as well as the leaders, and see who makes a come-back; and who may serge to the top from the middle of the pool!

My Round 5 Game

1. Director`s 1 pt. Bye

My Score

1.5/5 pts.: Draw: 1 (Rd. 2); Losses: 3 (Rds. 1, 3 & 4); Director`s 1 pt. Bye: 1 (Rd. 5)

My Opponents' & My Scores

3/5 pts. – Abderaouf Sekki (1740 – 2^nd seed) – I lost in Rd. 1.
- Maximo Alcantra Jr. (1726 – 3^rd seed) – I drew in Rd. 2
2/5 pts. – Junior Boy Deren Mai (1523) – I lost in Rd. 3.

• Aldo Lelievre (1523) – I lost in Rd. 4.

1.5/4 pts. - Me (1633)

Other Less Important Sections – Open

If I have time, I also report very minimally on the Open Section (Though I know all class players in Quebec & the Rest of Canada really are most interested in the U 1800 section!)

Leaders:5

1^st/2^nd - 4.5/54 pts. –GM Alexandre Le Siege (2500 – Quebec, Canada); GM Reynaldo Vera Gonzalez-Quevedo (2424 – Cuba).

3^rd/5^th – 4/5 pts. -GM Bator Sambuev (2503 – Quebec, Canada); GM Thomas Roussel-Roozmon (2463 – Quebec, Canada); Shawn Rodrigue-Lemieux (2257).

Favourites/Dark Horses (Non-leaders): 6

3.5/5 pts. – FM Olivier-Kenta Chiku-Ratte (2364); GM Luis Manuel Perez Rodriguez (2348 - Cuba); IM David Cummings (2340) ; IM Raymond Kaufman (2301) ; Hughes Masse ((2168) ; WIM Junior Girl Maili-Jade Ouellet (2079).

Full Results

See Chess-Results website (Canada): http://chess-results.com/fed.aspx?lan=1&fed=CAN

TEMPLATE BEGINS

Bob's Blog – Some History

For a number of years now, I have been posting my chess blog:

i) on my personal Facebook Account for my almost 850 Fb friends from around the world (in English): https://www.facebook.com/bob.armstrong.9235;
ii) sometimes on the national Canadian English chess discussion board, Chess Talk [CT] (https://forum.chesstalk.com/…/chesstalk-canada-s-chess-disc…);
iii) occasionally on other chess websites, such as that of FQE (Province of Quebec's Chess Association). That time the blog was posted in both French and English.

More recently I also have been "re-posting" my Fb blog:

i) on my Fb chess discussion group, Chess Chat - A Project of Chess Companions of Caissa (https://www.facebook.com/groups/340524269771672/);
ii) my Scarborough CC tournaments Fb Blog to SCC's Fb Page (URL above)
iii) my Annex CC tournaments Fb blog to ACC's Fb Group (https://www.facebook.com/groups/172335039452033/);

Henry Lam (Aka Dark Knight), the recently new owner of CT, and I have an agreement (From the summer of 2018) that I will re-post my Fb Blogs on CT for both my chess club official tournaments, and my non-club weekend (Sometimes longer; sometimes shorter) tournaments, in which I play between Summer 2018 and Summer 2019.

After that, Henry and I can then renew our agreement for another year if we both so wish.

So, under this agreement, most recently I have been re-posting my current Scarborough CC and Annex CC tournaments. My future non-club weekend blogs to and including Summer 2019 will be (Given my current schedule - from time to time, though, my life schedule may change so that I fit in a tournament not on my schedule):

1. The 2018 Hart House Holidays Open – Toronto (Prior to Christmas - Dec. 14-16/18) - Blogged;
2. The 2019 Hart House Reading Week Open – Toronto (February 16-18 – Only one short blog – having manic phase).
3. The 2019 Quebec Open – Longueuil (Next to Montreal) (July 21-7).
4. The 2019 Toronto Open (Aug. 31 – Sept. 2)

The National Canadian French Chess Discussion Board

Henri Hughes, a member of both the national English and French chess discussion boards (Chess Talk; Parlons Échecs), volunteers, subject to demands of his school studies, to translate my blogs into French, and post them to Parlons Échecs, also owned by Henry Lam. Thanks from all to Henri for his volunteer effort.

The Blog Focus

I mainly focus on the section I am playing in (Has been U 2000, U 1900 or U 1800). I feel that these class sections are often not covered by chess media, and yet, the bulk of chess tournament players are in the classes under 1900. And many of my class viewers have actually played players about whom I am blogging (Ones I play and ones with whom I may socialize during the tournament, who then are mentioned in the Blog). So this adds a bit more interest for them.

I do also generally cover (Bare Bones) the top section standings; but I have to have been able to get the results before the Blog goes to press. I sometimes will cover also the lower sections, if I have the results. For both, of course, it can be a matter of the time available (I am often doing my Blog in the wee hours of the morning).

I do hope my blogs will continue to provide a window onto class tournament chess, and what THIS chess player does in the day of club tournaments, and before and between rounds for weekend tournaments (A bit of a reality show - bits of my personal life).

I know many other chess players approach tournaments quite differently than I do (E.g. - study!), and so one cannot generalize from what I do.

Blog Feedback

Over the years, and in these more recent blogs, I have had generally positive feedback on my blogging, on both of my own Fb Accounts, the SCC & ACC Fb sites, and on CT.
It has been said that my writing style is easy to read, factual, and often entertaining. It is a find for all us "nosy" chess players!

Thanks to all those who have supported my Blogging on various sites, and kept encouraging me to continue.

TEMPLATE ENDS

Invitation

I am most happy to interact with readers re anything about which I have posted.....so react, comment, reply, post, etc. - both favourable comments and constructive criticism....I will do my best to respond to everyone, so long as I am where I have access to the internet.

And if some of the players, or non-players, wish to post something to supplement the blog, you are encouraged to do so.

So jump in with both feet, and we'll all enjoy the blogging adventure!

Bob A

[Bob Armstrong]

COQ/Quebec Open Chess Championship (Saturday, July 20 – Sat., July 27/19) - Blog

Rd. 5 – Tuesday, 19/7/23 (6:00 PM)

Bob's Chess Blog # 4 (Part III of 3 parts; see Parts I & II above)

Rd. 4

It was a long 4 ½ hr. game…it is still being entered; should be in Wednesday`s Blog # 5.

U 1800 Section Chess Report on Rd. 5 (Tuesday, July 23, 2019).

My U 1800 Section

I am rated 1633 (FQE). I am ranked # 17 out of 33 players (In the middle third).

Rating Spread

1700`s – 4 (Favourites)
1600’s – 15 (my rating is here)
1500’s – 12
1400’s – 1
1300’s – 0
1200`s - 1

Total - 33

U 1800 Standings After Rd. 4

Leaders:

1^st – 4.5/5 pts. – Geffrard Morinvil (1667)

2^nd/4^th – 4/5 pts. – Benoit Villeneuve (1762 – top seed); Guennadi Kozlov (1691); Haruaki Omichi (1674).

Favourites/Dark Horses (Non-leaders)

3.5/4 pts. –Alessio Di Matteo (1639); Dominic Boileau (1607).
3/4 pts. - Abderaouf Sekki (1740 – 2^nd seed); Maximo Alcantra Jr. (1726 – 3^rd seed); Patrice Gerard (1715 – 4^th seed); Ion Nica (1681); Ming Yu Xi (1647); Roger Gendron (1566); Junior Girl Rachel Zihan Wang (1556); Junior Boy Hugo Guillemette (1503 – 8 y.o.!)

It is my experience that Favourites/Dark Horses who may not start well, often end near the top…… 4 more rounds to go……a long tournament…….a lot can happen!!
We`ll watch all 10 for the final few rounds, as well as the leaders, and see who makes a come-back; and who may serge to the top from the middle of the pool!

My Round 5 Game

1. Director`s 1 pt. Bye

My Score

1.5/5 pts.: Draw: 1 (Rd. 2); Losses: 3 (Rds. 1, 3 & 4); Director`s 1 pt. Bye: 1 (Rd. 5)

My Opponents' & My Scores

3/5 pts. – Abderaouf Sekki (1740 – 2^nd seed) – I lost in Rd. 1.
- Maximo Alcantra Jr. (1726 – 3^rd seed) – I drew in Rd. 2
2/5 pts. – Junior Boy Deren Mai (1523) – I lost in Rd. 3.

• Aldo Lelievre (1523) – I lost in Rd. 4.

1.5/4 pts. - Me (1633)

Other Less Important Sections – Open

If I have time, I also report very minimally on the Open Section (Though I know all class players in Quebec & the Rest of Canada really are most interested in the U 1800 section!)

Leaders:5

1^st/2^nd - 4.5/54 pts. –GM Alexandre Le Siege (2500 – Quebec, Canada); GM Reynaldo Vera Gonzalez-Quevedo (2424 – Cuba).
3^rd/5^th – 4/5 pts. -GM Bator Sambuev (2503 – Quebec, Canada); GM Thomas Roussel-Roozmon (2463 – Quebec, Canada); Shawn Rodrigue-Lemieux (2257).

Favourites/Dark Horses (Non-leaders): 6

3.5/5 pts. – FM Olivier-Kenta Chiku-Ratte (2364); GM Luis Manuel Perez Rodriguez (2348 - Cuba); IM David Cummings (2340) ; IM Raymond Kaufman (2301) ; Hughes Masse ((2168) ; WIM Junior Girl Maili-Jade Ouellet (2079).

Full Results

See Chess-Results website (Canada): http://chess-results.com/fed.aspx?lan=1&fed=CAN

TEMPLATE BEGINS

Bob's Blog – Some History

For a number of years now, I have been posting my chess blog:

i) on my personal Facebook Account for my almost 850 Fb friends from around the world (in English): https://www.facebook.com/bob.armstrong.9235;
ii) sometimes on the national Canadian English chess discussion board, Chess Talk [CT] (https://forum.chesstalk.com/…/chesstalk-canada-s-chess-disc…);
iii) occasionally on other chess websites, such as that of FQE (Province of Quebec's Chess Association). That time the blog was posted in both French and English.

More recently I also have been "re-posting" my Fb blog:

i) on my Fb chess discussion group, Chess Chat - A Project of Chess Companions of Caissa (https://www.facebook.com/groups/340524269771672/);
ii) my Scarborough CC tournaments Fb Blog to SCC's Fb Page (URL above)
iii) my Annex CC tournaments Fb blog to ACC's Fb Group (https://www.facebook.com/groups/172335039452033/);

Henry Lam (Aka Dark Knight), the recently new owner of CT, and I have an agreement (From the summer of 2018) that I will re-post my Fb Blogs on CT for both my chess club official tournaments, and my non-club weekend (Sometimes longer; sometimes shorter) tournaments, in which I play between Summer 2018 and Summer 2019.

After that, Henry and I can then renew our agreement for another year if we both so wish.

So, under this agreement, most recently I have been re-posting my current Scarborough CC and Annex CC tournaments. My future non-club weekend blogs to and including Summer 2019 will be (Given my current schedule - from time to time, though, my life schedule may change so that I fit in a tournament not on my schedule):

1. The 2018 Hart House Holidays Open – Toronto (Prior to Christmas - Dec. 14-16/18) - Blogged;
2. The 2019 Hart House Reading Week Open – Toronto (February 16-18 – Only one short blog – having manic phase).
3. The 2019 Quebec Open – Longueuil (Next to Montreal) (July 21-7).
4. The 2019 Toronto Open (Aug. 31 – Sept. 2)

The National Canadian French Chess Discussion Board

Henri Hughes, a member of both the national English and French chess discussion boards (Chess Talk; Parlons Échecs), volunteers, subject to demands of his school studies, to translate my blogs into French, and post them to Parlons Échecs, also owned by Henry Lam. Thanks from all to Henri for his volunteer effort.

The Blog Focus

I mainly focus on the section I am playing in (Has been U 2000, U 1900 or U 1800). I feel that these class sections are often not covered by chess media, and yet, the bulk of chess tournament players are in the classes under 1900. And many of my class viewers have actually played players about whom I am blogging (Ones I play and ones with whom I may socialize during the tournament, who then are mentioned in the Blog). So this adds a bit more interest for them.
I do also generally cover (Bare Bones) the top section standings; but I have to have been able to get the results before the Blog goes to press. I sometimes will cover also the lower sections, if I have the results. For both, of course, it can be a matter of the time available (I am often doing my Blog in the wee hours of the morning).
I do hope my blogs will continue to provide a window onto class tournament chess, and what THIS chess player does in the day of club tournaments, and before and between rounds for weekend tournaments (A bit of a reality show - bits of my personal life).
I know many other chess players approach tournaments quite differently than I do (E.g. - study!), and so one cannot generalize from what I do.

Blog Feedback

Over the years, and in these more recent blogs, I have had generally positive feedback on my blogging, on both of my own Fb Accounts, the SCC & ACC Fb sites, and on CT.
It has been said that my writing style is easy to read, factual, and often entertaining. It is a find for all us "nosy" chess players!

Thanks to all those who have supported my Blogging on various sites, and kept encouraging me to continue.

TEMPLATE ENDS

Invitation

I am most happy to interact with readers re anything about which I have posted.....so react, comment, reply, post, etc. - both favourable comments and constructive criticism....I will do my best to respond to everyone, so long as I am where I have access to the internet.

And if some of the players, or non-players, wish to post something to supplement the blog, you are encouraged to do so.

So jump in with both feet, and we'll all enjoy the blogging adventure!

Bob A

[Bob Armstrong]

COQ/Quebec Open Chess Championship (Saturday, July 20 – Sat., July 27/19) - Blog

Rd. 6 – Wednesday, 19/7/24 (6:00 PM)

Bob's Chess Blog # 5 (Part I of 4 parts)
(See Knight Logo below)

Tournament

Name: Championnat ouvert d’echecs du Quebec (COQ)/Quebec Open Chess Championship
Dates: July 20 – 27/19
Rounds: 9
Sections: 5: Open (Any level player); U 2000; U 1800; \U 1600; U 1400.
Registrations: 188 registrants: Open: 52; U 2000: 37; U 1800: 32; U 1600 - 30; U 1400: 37
Playing Up: In Quebec, all sections are truly “open” – you can play as long as you are not at or over the ceiling rating; no playing up fee.
Time Control: 40/90 + 30 (30 sec. increment from move 1)

Blog Note:

This Blog, here on my personal Facebook page, is directly re-posted a few other places - so references here refer to this Fb platform.

The Day of Rd. 6 (Wednesday, 19/7/24)

I`ve been here at the Sandman Hotel (Tournament location), in Longueuil, Quebec, since 4:30 PM Friday. I am sharing the room with my Toronto friend, Mario Moran-Venegas (U 2000 section ). We are natural roomies and both of us are having great `chess holidays`.
Unusual for me in weekend and longer tournaments, I got 6 hrs. sleep last night (11:00 PM Tuesday to 5:00 AM today). I was totally refreshed and wide-awake. So I dressed, and went to my office down on the main floor of the hotel. ….only to find that Étienne was already there, beating out his work time! We chatted a bit – he was from France, but for a long time now, a Canadian citizen.
Then I settled into finishing and posting this Tuesday Blog # 5. In the middle, about 6:30 PM, I went out briefly to find a dark roast coffee. I went to the already busy Longueuil subway station…..got my fix at Tim`s and then returned to work with my new partner, Etienne. He was using the laptop station part of the set-up in the Sandman business office. After posting my Blog # 5, I then went into my daily routine……..

Template Note:

There are sections of this blog that are a standard “template” which I repeat in each Blog.
The template must be here for any new readers of my Blog.
So I ask my regular readers to be tolerant. If you have read the template part previously, you can skip from “Template Begins” to “Template Ends” (I will alert you immediately after the template if there are any revisions you missed).

Charging, in the Wee Hours, into Monday Morning
The regular readers of my blog (I’ve been doing this since the mid-2000’s) will be familiar with my normal morning routine that I would go through. I am doing it now in `MY` office in the hotel`s business office – I`ve sort of taken it over……I`ve left the template below as if I was in my office in our Toronto home.

TEMPLATE BEGINS

Victim of Routine

As usual, I then went to my home office ((I am retired + unemployed – life is fine except for my slave-driver company, Canadian Life Consulting Cooperative [Quite a mouthful, but simply put: CLCC], where I must volunteer my work time for free all day long, 24/7!); and fired up my old laptop.

My Daily Personal Project Tasks

1. Check for my e-mails and Fb messages.
2. Check new posts/comments on ChessTalk (CT);
3. Check my Twitter feed to see what had been happening in the world (I follow numerous mainstream media from countries around the world, such as CBC, Toronto Star, National Post, NBC, The New York Times, The Washington Post, France 24, China Daily, Al Jezeera (English), Japan Times, Sputnik News, The Guardian, etc.). I post the most relevant...see below.
4. Fb Project # 1 (My Company's) - My little company (Not legally registered yet) is called, as said above, Canadian Life Consulting Cooperative (CLCC). So I update my company's Fb page, Canadian Life Consulting (CLC) - https://www.facebook.com/Canadian-Li...lting-16406543…/. I do this by checking my Twitter inbox for articles to re-post onto CLC. I then also check my Fb newsfeed and some of my Fb friends timelines for posts to "share".
5. Update one of the discussion groups formed under my company page, called Canadian Life Consulting Cooperative Supporters' Group (Or CLCC Supporters) - https://www.facebook.com/groups/2042495809374373/. I update it by sharing some more discussable of the posts now on the CLC page.
6. Fb Project # 2 (My Own): Update this Fb world events/politics discussion group that I have created here on my own personal Fb account, called PEERS (A Discussion Club of Equals) – https://www.facebook.com/bob.armstrong.9235. I do this by also sharing some of the CLC page posts. But I also share some of my sources' posts directly to this discussion club.
7. I share at least one chess post per day to my Fb chess discussion club, Chess Chat, formed under my personal Fb account - https://www.facebook.com/groups/340524269771672/.
8. When I find them, I share discussable religious posts to my World Religions discussion club Fb Group, Theist Community - https://www.facebook.com/groups/1052227598173591/.
Sometimes these also appear in PEERS.
9. I have another retiree project besides my 2 Facebook Projects.
Chess is a passionate hobby of mine, as you know. But I have never really studied seriously.
But what I do is I enter all my games, and annotate them, to try to learn something - Grandmasters do recommend this often. In addition, I integrate the opening (the first 10 moves) into an opening/defence tree I have for the opening/defence played. The value of this is pretty uncertain, given my inability to remember lines - but I do develop general impressions of how the opening can go.

So on my own time, I go back and forth between the 2 Facebook projects and my chess hobby project.

My 35/25 System

As well, I go back and forth between my routine items above and my own personal life tasks to be done that day. But I have a somewhat unique system for doing this.
Recently I found that I was spending a lot more time on my three retiree projects than my normal life tasks - don't we all spend more time on what we enjoy!
But I was falling behind in "life" while keeping up in the "Fb/chess" projects. So I did have to deal with this issue.
So I came up with the "35/25 System". What this is:
When I am at home, I bite the bullet and I spend 35 min. on my life tasks, which I think of as “working for myself”; I even set the alarm! Then I reward myself with 25 min. on my 3 retiree projects (Facebook [2] & Chess). I try very hard to religiously stop when I am to change phases.
This has actually worked out well....I am still abysmally behind in "Life", but not nearly as much as I used to be! LOL

TEMPLATE ENDS

Back to Wednesday Morning

So today I am again just following my normal routine in my Longueuil office. – my Ottawa chess friend, Eric, showed up to use the desktop, just as I was finishing, and Mario arrived to go to McD`s for breakfast. After breakfast, we found a pharmacy in the complex for Mario to get something he needed.
At 9:30 AM, Mario started prepping for his junior girl opponent tonight (Who recently defeated an expert!! Whoa…..prep is badly needed for this one!). I came back down into the salt mines. Mario soon showed up with my Rd. 5, 4 ½ hr. game (78 moves) on a memory stick, and we put on my desktop, and I then incorporated it into the draft Wednesday, Blog # 5.
Then I bore down to do the Tuesday Blog # 4; I was able to do the whole thing and get it posted.
And at 6:00 AM I went back up to the room

Back to Bed
Now I was finally tiring again, and so I just hopped back into bed to await Mario’s 8:30 AM alarm…I got to sleep fairly quickly, and woke up with the alarm. I had a bowl of cereal in the room, but then did still join Mario when he went for breakfast at the near-by McDonald’s; I got a needed 2^nd coffee of the day.

(See Parts II, III & IV below)

Bob A

[Bob Armstrong]

COQ/Quebec Open Chess Championship (Saturday, July 20 – Sat., July 27/19) - Blog

Rd. 6 – Wednesday, 19/7/24 (6:00 PM)

Bob's Chess Blog # 5 (Part II of 4 parts; see Part I above)

Back to the Hotel

Mario did some preparation work for his R. 5 opponent this evening. I went back to the salt mines to continue updating my myriad of Facebook projects.
I checked on the activity around my Tuesday Blog # 4 which I had just posted earlier this morning – I was somewhat shocked…..in the first 1 ½ hrs. of my post, the viewership on ChessTalk was 15 views per hour! I know it will tail down as time goes on (Usually in the first 16-20 hrs. of posting, the blogs average 6 views per hour), but this is, to me, surprising early activity/viewing. Then Mario brought in my Rd. 4 game and we put it on the desktop for copying into this blog (See below).

Contemplation

I practice a life-enhancement technique I developed called `Contemplation`- it is something like meditation or Mindfulness, but in fact quite different in goal…..I have a Fb group where I explain it to those who are interested. I do it regularly during the day. But I have been pretty busy these last few days, and haven`t really set aside a chunk of time to do it. I was now pretty current on everything, so I decide to go outside and pace for a while on the sidewalk outside the hotel, and do my thing….

Afternoon

At noon, I was now tired again…..unusual for so early in the day, when I`ve had a normal sleep. Mario and I chatted for a while, and then I took my 1hr. siesta (I pretty much need one daily now).
When I got up, I was exceptionally restless……..not sure if it was due to some movement on the Bi-Polar front. But my contemplation technique not only works for me when I am relaxed, but it can also be very helpful if I am disturbed for no apparent reason……So at 2:00 PM I went down to go outside the hotel to pace/contemplate `til my friend, Ed Selling (U 2000 section) drove over to get Mario and I. We were going to linner together.
But in the lobby I saw a chess friend I`d made last year at the COQ, Francois Chevalier. We chatted and then one of the arbiters came up to explain his opponent for round 6 was blind, and for Francois to tell the opponent his move, they had put them to play in the arbiters` office, so they would not disturb players around them……a very nice accommodation. Then I went outside to contemplate.

Linner

Ed drove up about 2:45 PM and Mario had now come down, so we went again to St. Hubert in the Place Longueuil and had our meal on the patio. Ed regaled us with some stories of his past careers (He`s had a few), we talked chess teaching (he and Mario both teach scholastic chess), and, as he is from New York (Loves to come to Quebec/Canada for our tournaments), we did talk some USA politics.
Ed returned us to the hotel a bit before 5PM, and he went back to his hotel close by – he was then returning for the Rd. 6.
Mario went to prepare. I was by now somewhat depressed, as well as restless still. I really had little interest in playing Rd. 6. So I went to contemplate some more. Then I sat in the hotel reception for a bit – talked to a few Montreal chess players I`d met at prior Montreal tournaments; then Eric Van Dusen from Ottawa joined me briefly – he was taking a bye to go to the Just For Laugh`s Festival Wed. night. Then my Toronto friend from my section came in and sat, and we chatted and commiserated about the results side of this tournament for both of us.

Rd. 6

I went back up to my room briefly, and when I came down, I forgot my back roll I use on my chair when playing. I played White against Francis Malloy (1513). I got permission from the arbiter to go up and get the roll, when I realized I`d forgotten it. We finished close to 10:00 PM.

Post-Rd. 6

From 10:00 – 10:30 PM, all the players who had finished, and the hotel guests, watched the spectacular fireworks display from the hotel parking lot. They occur a couple of times a week during a month of the summer, and are sponsored by a different country each time – tonight it was put on by Australia. The bridge nearby is actually closed for this, so people can go up on the bridge to watch the fireworks. Though quite tired from my game, I then watched the finish of Alexandre defeating Bator on Bd. 1, to become co-leader. About 11:00 PM I went up to the room, and hit the sack at 11:30 PM.

(Parts III & 4 below)

Bob A

[Bob Armstrong]

COQ/Quebec Open Chess Championship (Saturday, July 20 – Sat., July 27/19) - Blog

Rd. 6 – Wednesday, 19/7/24 (6:00 PM)

Bob's Chess Blog # 5 (Part III of 4 parts; see Parts I & II above)


My Prior Round Games

Rd. 4

[Event "COQ 2019"]
[Site "Longueuil, Québec"]
[Date "19/7/23"]
[Round "4"]
[White "Armstrong, Robert (Bob) J.(1633)"]
[Black "Aldo Lelievre (1523)"]
[Result "0-1"]
[Annotator "Houdini 6.02 Pro x64-pext (90m)"]
[PlyCount "155"]

{[%mdl 8192] B27: Sicilian: 2 Nf3, unusual Black 2nd moves} 1. e4 g6 2. d4 Bg7 3. Nf3 c5 4. c3 Qa5 {last book move} 5. Bd2 (5. Bc4 cxd4 6. O-O d6 $16) 5...Qb6 {Black threatens to win material: Qb6xb2} (5... Nf6 6. Bd3 d5 7. c4 $14) 6. Qc2 Nc6 (6... d5 7. exd5 Nf6 8. Bc4 $14) 7. dxc5 (7. d5 $5 Ne5 8. Nxe5 Bxe5 9. Na3 $16) 7... Qxc5 $11 8. Be3 Qa5 9. Nbd2 d6 {Prevents intrusion on c5+e5} (9... Qc7 10. h3 $11) 10. Bd3 Bg4 (10... Nf6 11. O-O $11) 11. h3 $14 Bd7 12. Nb3{White threatens to win material: Nb3xa5} (12. O-O Nf6 $14) 12... Qc7 $11 13. O-O {White has an active position} Rc8 (13... Nf6 14. Be2 $11) 14. Nfd4 Nb4 $4(14... Nf6 $142 $11 {this is the best way to fight back}) 15. cxb4 $18 Qd8 (15... Qxc2 {is no salvation} 16. Nxc2 (16. Bxc2 $6 e5 $18) 16... Bxb2 17. Rab1$18) 16. Qe2 a6 17. Rac1 e5 (17... Nf6 {is not much help} 18. Na5 Rb8 19. Ndb3$18) 18. Rxc8 (18. Nf3 {and White can already relax} Nf6 19. Na5 b5 20. Rxc8 Qxc8 $18) 18... Bxc8 19. Nf3 f5 (19... Nf6 $18 {hoping against hope}) 20. exf5 gxf5 21. Nh2 (21. Bc4 $142 {ends the debate} f4 22. Bxf4 Qe7 $18) 21... Nf6 22. Bg5 (22. b5 $142 {keeps an even firmer grip} O-O 23. bxa6 bxa6 $18) 22... h5 (22... O-O $18 {praying for a miracle}) 23. Rd1 b5 (23... O-O {does not helpmuch} 24. Nf1 Qe8 25. Ng3 $18) 24. Qc2 (24. Nd4 $142 $1 {might be the shorterpath} e4 25. Bc2 O-O $18) 24... Qd7 25. Bf1 (25. Nf1 $142 {seems even better}O-O 26. Ng3 e4 $18) 25... Nh7 (25... O-O {does not win a prize} 26. Nf3 Re8 27.Be2 $18) 26. Be3 (26. Rxd6 $142 {makes it even easier for White} Qxd6 27. Qxc8+
Kf7 28. Qxf5+ Kg8 $18) 26... Rg8 (26... Kf7 {does not solve anything} 27. Be2 Nf8 28. Bc5 $18) 27. Kh1 (27. Rxd6 $142 $1 {seems even better} Qxd6 28. Qxc8+ Kf7 29. Qxf5+ Qf6 30. Qxh5+ Qg6 31. Qxg6+ Kxg6 32. Bd3+ Kf7 33. Bxh7 Rd8 $18)27... Bf6 (27... Kf7 {doesn't change anything anymore} 28. Nc5 $1 {Deflection:d6} Qe7 $18) 28. Qd2 (28. Rxd6 $142 $1 {and White has reached his goal} Qxd6 29. Qxc8+ Kf7 30. Qxf5 Rg7 31. Qxh5+ Kg8 $18) 28... Be7 (28... f4 {doesn't get the cat off the tree} 29. Bb6 Be7 30. Rc1 $18) 29. Qe2 (29. f4 $142 $5 {might be the shorter path} exf4 30. Bxf4 Nf6 $18) 29... Nf6 30. f3 (30. f4 {and White can already relax} e4 $18) 30... h4 (30... f4 {is not the saving move
} 31. Bf2 $18) 31. Qc2 (31. f4 {keeps an even firmer grip} Ne4 32. Bf2 Qe6 33. fxe5 dxe5 $18) 31... Nh5 32. Rc1 (32. Bd3 $142 $5 {seems even better} Ng3+ 33. Kg1 e4 $18) 32... Ng3+ 33. Kg1 Kf7 (33... Bb7 {doesn't change the outcome of the game} 34. Bd3 Bd5 35. Bf2 $18) 34. f4 (34. Bd3 $142 {might be the shorter path} Bb7 $18) 34... Bb7 35. Qc7 (35. fxe5 Nxf1 36. Kxf1 (36. Rxf1 $143 Rxg2+ 37. Qxg2 Bxg2 38. Kxg2 dxe5 $17) (36. Nxf1 $2 Rxg2+ 37. Qxg2 Bxg2 38. Kxg2 dxe5 $19) 36... Bxg2+ 37. Ke1 Bxh3 38. Nf3 $18) 35... Qxc7 $16 36. Rxc7 Nxf1 37. Nxf1 $4 {overlooking an easy win} (37. Kxf1 Bxg2+ 38. Ke1 $16) 37... Bxg2 (37... Rxg2+ $142 {and Black has triumphed} 38. Kh1 Bd5 $19) 38. fxe5 $18 Bxh3+ $4 {Black crumbles in face of a dire situation} (38... dxe5 39. Bc5 Bxh3+ 40. Kf2 $16) 39. Kf2 (39. Kh2 $142 {secures the point} dxe5 40. Kxh3 $18) 39...
Rg2+ 40. Kf3 dxe5 (40... Ke8 41. e6 Bf6 42. Bf4 $18) 41. Bc5 e4+ $6 {just waiting for the end} (41... Rxb2 42. Ne3 f4 43. Rxe7+ Kg6 $18) 42. Ke3 f4+ 43. Kxf4 Rg4+ 44. Ke3 Bxf1 45. Rxe7+ ({Inferior is} 45. Bxe7 h3 46. Bd6+ Kg6 $18) 45... Kg8 (45... Kg6 46. Nd2 Bg2 47. Bd6 $18) 46. Rxe4 (46. Nd2 $5 {keeps an even firmer grip} Bg2 47. Nxe4 Rg6 $18) 46... Rg2 (46... Rxe4+ 47. Kxe4 Bc4 48. Bd6 $18) 47. Rxh4 Rxb2 (47... Re2+ {a fruitless try to alter the course of the game} 48. Kf4 Rxb2 49. Rh6 Rxa2 50. Na5 $18) 48. Na5 (48. Rg4+ Kh7 49. Nd2 $18) 48... Rxa2 49. Rf4 Bh3 50. Rf8+ Kh7 51. Ra8 Ra3+ (51... Kh6 {doesn't get the bull off the ice} 52. Kf4 Bf1 53. Rxa6+ Kh5 54. Ra8 $18) 52. Kf4 Bg2 53. Rxa6 Rc3 (53... Ra1 {cannot change destiny} 54. Rb6 $18) 54. Rd6 Bf1 (54... Rf3+ {is the last straw} 55. Ke5 Rg3 $18) 55. Nc6 Rc4+ (55... Bh3 $18 {desperation})56. Nd4 (56. Kg5 Re4 57. Nd4 Be2 58. Rd7+ Kg8 59. Nf5 Rg4+ 60. Kf6 Rf4 61. Ke5 Rf3 62. Nh6+ Kh8 63. Bd4 Rd3 64. Kf6 Bh5 65. Kg5+ Rxd4 66. Rxd4 Kg7 67. Kxh5 Kf6 68. Re4 Kg7 69. Ng8 Kh7 70. Re7+ Kxg8 71. Kg6 Kf8 72. Re3 Kg8 73. Re8#)56... Kg8 57. Ke5 Rc1 (57... Rc3 {doesn't improve anything} 58. Rb6 Rh3 59. Rb8+ Kh7 60. Nxb5 Rh5+ 61. Kd6 Rh6+ 62. Kc7 $18) 58. Rf6 (58. Rg6+ Kf7 59. Rg1 Re1+ 60. Kd6 Kf6 $18) 58... Re1+ (58... Bd3 {doesn't do any good} 59. Rb6 $18) 59. Kd6 Ra1 (59... Bd3 {hardly improves anything} 60. Kc6 Rc1 61. Nxb5 Be4+ 62.
Kc7 $18) 60. Kc7 (60. Rxf1 {makes it even easier for White} Rxf1 61. Nxb5 Ra1 $18) 60... Kg7 (60... Bc4 {otherwise it's curtains at once} 61. Rf8+ Kh7 $18) 61. Rf2 (61. Rxf1 $142 {and the rest is a matter of technique} Rxf1 62. Nxb5 $18) 61... Bc4 62. Kb6 (62. Nxb5 $5 {and White can already relax} Rc1 63. Kc6 Rd1 $18) 62... Ra8 63. Bd6 Rd8 64. Kc7 Ra8 65. Bc5 Ra6 $4 (65... Ra1 66. Nxb5 Re1 $18) 66. Nf5+ $18 Kh7 (66... Kg6 {cannot undo what has already been done} 67. Nd6 Bd3 $18) 67. Nd4 (67. Rg2 Bd5 68. Rg7+ Kh8 69. Bd4 Rc6+ 70. Kd7 Rc4 71. Rg6+ Rxd4 72. Nxd4 Bh1 73. Rg5 Be4 74. Ke7 Kh7 75. Kf7 Kh6 76. Kf6 Bb1 77. Nf5+ Bxf5 78. Rxf5 Kh7 79. Rxb5 Kh8 80. Kf7 Kh7 81. Rh5#) 67... Rg6 $4 (67... Kg7
68. Rf8 Kh7 $18) 68. Nc6 $18 Re6 69. Bd6 Re8 (69... Re4 $18 {there is nothing better in the position}) 70. Ne5 Bb3 71. Rf7+ (71. Rf3 $142 {and White can already relax} Be6 72. Kc6 $18) 71... Kg8 (71... Bxf7 {is no salvation} 72. Nxf7 Kg6 73. Ne5+ Kf5 $18) 72. Rf2 (72. Rf3 Ba2 73. Ra3 Be6 74. Rg3+ Kh7 75. Nd7 Bxd7 76. Kxd7 Re1 77. Rg5 Ra1 78. Rxb5 Ra7+ 79. Kc6 Ra6+ 80. Kd5 Ra1 81. Rc5 Rb1 82. b5 Kg6 83. Kc6 Ra1 84. b6 Ra6 85. Kb5 Ra1 86. b7 Rb1+ 87. Kc6 Kh6 88. b8=Q Rxb8 89. Bxb8 Kh7 90. Bd6 Kg6 91. Kd7 Kh7 92. Rg5 Kh8 93. Ke6 Kh7 94. Bf8 Kh8 95. Kf7 Kh7 96. Rh5#) 72... Kh7 73. Rf3 (73. Rg2 $142 $5 {might be the shorter path} Kh8 $18) 73... Bd1 (73... Bc2 {does not save the day} 74. Rc3 Be4 75. Rg3 $18) 74. Ra3 (74. Rg3 Rg8 75. Rxg8 Kxg8 76. Nc6 $18) 74... Re6 (74...Kg7 {cannot change what is in store for ?} 75. Ra5 Be2 76. Nc6 $18) 75. Nd7 (75. Rd3 Ba4 76. Kd7 Rf6 77. Rh3+ Rh6 78. Rg3 Bc2 79. Ke7 Bf5 80. Rg5 Re6+ 81. Kf7 Rxd6 82. Rxf5 Ra6 83. Rh5+ Rh6 84. Rxh6+ Kxh6 85. Nf3 Kh5 86. Nd4 Kg4 87. Ke6 Kh5 88. Nxb5 Kg5 89. Nd4 Kf4 90. Nf5 Kg4 91. b5 Kf3 92. b6 Ke2 93. b7 Kd1 94. b8=Q Kd2 95. Qb2+ Kd3 96. Ke5 Kc4 97. Nd4 Kd3 98. Qc2+ Ke3 99. Qe2#) 75...Kg7 76. Ne5 Kf6 $4 (76... Kh7 77. Rd3 Bc2 78. Rh3+ Kg7 79. Rg3+ Kf6 80. Rf3+ Kg7 $18) 77. Nf3 (77. Rd3 {keeps an even firmer grip} Be2 78. Rd2 Bh5 79. Rf2+ Kg7 $18) 77... Be2 (77... Ba4 $18 {is one last hope}) 78. Nd4 *

0-1


U 1800 Section Chess Report on Rd. 6 (Wednesday, July 24, 2019).

My U 1800 Section

I am rated 1633 (FQE). I am ranked # 17 out of 33 players (In the middle third).

Rating Spread

1700`s – 4 (Favourites)
1600’s – 15 (my rating is here)
1500’s – 12
1400’s – 1
1300’s – 0
1200`s - 1

Total - 33

U 1800 Standings After Rd. 6

Leaders:

1^st – 4.5/5 pts. – Geffrard Morinvil (1667)
2^nd/4^th – 4/5 pts. – Benoit Villeneuve (1762 – top seed); Guennadi Kozlov (1691); Haruaki Omichi (1674).

Favourites/Dark Horses (Non-leaders)

3.5/4 pts. –Alessio Di Matteo (1639); Dominic Boileau (1607).
3/4 pts. - Abderaouf Sekki (1740 – 2^nd seed); Maximo Alcantra Jr. (1726 – 3^rd seed); Patrice Gerard (1715 – 4^th seed); Ion Nica (1681); Ming Yu Xi (1647); Roger Gendron (1566); Junior Girl Rachel Zihan Wang (1556); Junior Boy Hugo Guillemette (1503 – 8 y.o.!)

It is my experience that Favourites/Dark Horses who may not start well, often end near the top…… 4 more rounds to go……a long tournament…….a lot can happen!!
We`ll watch all 10 for the final few rounds, as well as the leaders, and see who makes a come-back; and who may serge to the top from the middle of the pool!

My Round 6 Game

Not yet entered; will post it in Friday Blog # 7. Francis and I drew – a hard-fought battle.

My Score

2/6 pts.: Draws: 2 (Rds. 2 & 6); Losses: 3 (Rds. 1, 3 & 4); Director`s 1 pt. Bye: 1 (Rd. 5)

My Opponents' & My Scores

4/6 pts. – Abderaouf Sekki (1740 – 2^nd seed) – I lost in Rd. 1.
3.5/6 pts. - Maximo Alcantra Jr. (1726 – 3^rd seed) – I drew in Rd. 2
3/6 pts. - Aldo Lelievre (1523) – I lost in Rd. 4.
2/6 pts. –- Me (1633)

• Junior Boy Deren Mai (1523) – I lost in Rd. 3.
• Francis Malloy (1513) – I drew in Rd. 6.

(See Part IV below)

Bob A

[Bob Armstrong]

COQ/Quebec Open Chess Championship (Saturday, July 20 – Sat., July 27/19) - Blog

Rd. 6 – Wednesday, 19/7/24 (6:00 PM)

Bob's Chess Blog # 5 (Part III of 4 parts; see Parts I & II above)

Other Less Important Sections – Open

If I have time, I also report very minimally on the Open Section (Though I know all class players in Quebec & the Rest of Canada really are most interested in the U 1800 section!)

Leaders:6

1^st/2^nd - 5.5/6 pts. –GM Alexandre Le Siege (2500 – Quebec, Canada); GM Reynaldo Vera Gonzalez-Quevedo (2424 – Cuba).
3^rd/6^th – 4.5/6 pts. - GM Thomas Roussel-Roozmon (2463 – Quebec, Canada); FM Olivier-Kenta Chiku-Ratte (2364); Hughes Masse ((2168); WIM Junior Girl Maili-Jade Ouellet (2079).

Favourites/Dark Horses (Non-leaders): 6

4/6 pts. – GM Bator Sambuev (2503 – Quebec, Canada); IM David Cummings (2340); Shawn Rodrigue-Lemieux (2257); Dario Leonel Martinez Mulet (2123); CM Taira Tyler Tanaka ((2109); Ananda Saha (2059)
3.5/6 pts. –GM Luis Manuel Perez Rodriguez (2348 - Cuba); IM Raymond Kaufman (2301).

Full Results

See Chess-Results website (Canada): http://chess-results.com/fed.aspx?lan=1&fed=CAN

TEMPLATE BEGINS

Bob's Blog – Some History

For a number of years now, I have been posting my chess blog:

i) on my personal Facebook Account for my almost 850 Fb friends from around the world (in English): https://www.facebook.com/bob.armstrong.9235;
ii) sometimes on the national Canadian English chess discussion board, Chess Talk [CT] (https://forum.chesstalk.com/…/chesstalk-canada-s-chess-disc…);
iii) occasionally on other chess websites, such as that of FQE (Province of Quebec's Chess Association). That time the blog was posted in both French and English.

More recently I also have been "re-posting" my Fb blog:

i) on my Fb chess discussion group, Chess Chat - A Project of Chess Companions of Caissa (https://www.facebook.com/groups/340524269771672/);
ii) my Scarborough CC tournaments Fb Blog to SCC's Fb Page (URL above)
iii) my Annex CC tournaments Fb blog to ACC's Fb Group (https://www.facebook.com/groups/172335039452033/);

Henry Lam (Aka Dark Knight), the recently new owner of CT, and I have an agreement (From the summer of 2018) that I will re-post my Fb Blogs on CT for both my chess club official tournaments, and my non-club weekend (Sometimes longer; sometimes shorter) tournaments, in which I play between Summer 2018 and Summer 2019.

After that, Henry and I can then renew our agreement for another year if we both so wish.

So, under this agreement, most recently I have been re-posting my current Scarborough CC and Annex CC tournaments. My future non-club weekend blogs to and including Summer 2019 will be (Given my current schedule - from time to time, though, my life schedule may change so that I fit in a tournament not on my schedule):

1. The 2018 Hart House Holidays Open – Toronto (Prior to Christmas - Dec. 14-16/18) - Blogged;
2. The 2019 Hart House Reading Week Open – Toronto (February 16-18 – Only one short blog – having manic phase).
3. The 2019 Quebec Open – Longueuil (Next to Montreal) (July 21-7).
4. The 2019 Toronto Open (Aug. 31 – Sept. 2)

The National Canadian French Chess Discussion Board

Henri Hughes, a member of both the national English and French chess discussion boards (Chess Talk; Parlons Échecs), volunteers, subject to demands of his school studies, to translate my blogs into French, and post them to Parlons Échecs, also owned by Henry Lam. Thanks from all to Henri for his volunteer effort.

The Blog Focus

I mainly focus on the section I am playing in (Has been U 2000, U 1900 or U 1800). I feel that these class sections are often not covered by chess media, and yet, the bulk of chess tournament players are in the classes under 1900. And many of my class viewers have actually played players about whom I am blogging (Ones I play and ones with whom I may socialize during the tournament, who then are mentioned in the Blog). So this adds a bit more interest for them.
I do also generally cover (Bare Bones) the top section standings; but I have to have been able to get the results before the Blog goes to press. I sometimes will cover also the lower sections, if I have the results. For both, of course, it can be a matter of the time available (I am often doing my Blog in the wee hours of the morning).
I do hope my blogs will continue to provide a window onto class tournament chess, and what THIS chess player does in the day of club tournaments, and before and between rounds for weekend tournaments (A bit of a reality show - bits of my personal life).
I know many other chess players approach tournaments quite differently than I do (E.g. - study!), and so one cannot generalize from what I do.

Blog Feedback

Over the years, and in these more recent blogs, I have had generally positive feedback on my blogging, on both of my own Fb Accounts, the SCC & ACC Fb sites, and on CT.
It has been said that my writing style is easy to read, factual, and often entertaining. It is a find for all us "nosy" chess players!
Thanks to all those who have supported my Blogging on various sites, and kept encouraging me to continue.

TEMPLATE ENDS

Invitation

I am most happy to interact with readers re anything about which I have posted.....so react, comment, reply, post, etc. - both favourable comments and constructive criticism....I will do my best to respond to everyone, so long as I am where I have access to the internet.
And if some of the players, or non-players, wish to post something to supplement the blog, you are encouraged to do so.
So jump in with both feet, and we'll all enjoy the blogging adventure!

Bob A

[Bob Armstrong]

Chess Championship (Saturday, July 20 – Sat., July 27/19) - Blog

Rd. 7 – Thursday, 19/7/25 (6:00 PM)

Bob's Chess Blog # 6 (Part I of 4 parts)
(See Knight Logo below)

Tournament

Name: Championnat ouvert d’echecs du Quebec (COQ)/Quebec Open Chess Championship
Dates: July 20 – 27/19
Rounds: 9
Sections: 5: Open (Any level player); U 2000; U 1800; \U 1600; U 1400.
Registrations: 188 registrants: Open: 52; U 2000: 37; U 1800: 32; U 1600 - 30; U 1400: 37
Playing Up: In Quebec, all sections are truly “open” – you can play as long as you are not at or over the ceiling rating; no playing up fee.
Time Control: 40/90 + 30 (30 sec. increment from move 1)

Blog Note:

This Blog, here on my personal Facebook page, is directly re-posted a few other places - so references here refer to this Fb platform.

The Day of Rd. 7 (Thursday, 19/7/25)

I`ve been here at the Sandman Hotel (Tournament location), in Longueuil, Quebec, since 4:30 PM, Friday, July 19). I am sharing the room with my Toronto friend, Mario Moran-Venegas (U 2000 section ). We are natural roomies and both of us are having great `chess holidays`.
I is not unusual for me in weekend and longer tournaments, to sleep short and erratically (I have to be careful; sleep deficit and Bi-Polar Disorder do not go well together). So today I awoke at 2:00 AM (Went to bed Wednesday night at 11:30 PM!). Unlike some times when this happens, I was not totally refreshed and really wide-awake. So I went back to be……you guessed it……nope……no way I am going back to sleep.
So at 3:00 AM I dressed, and went to my office down on the main floor of the hotel. ….I was not up this morning to heading for the 24 hr. Tim`s in Longueuil Place…..I`ll just wait for my dark roast `til the subway station across the street opens at 6:00 AM.
Then I settled into:

1. finishing and posting the Wednesday Blog # 5.
2. Updating my own standings lists for both the U 1800 section and the Open section – the two I report on.
3. Entered into my normal daily routine (See Template below).
4. Checked some stats on ChessTalk Blog views: the stats have settled; on average, in the first 16-24 hrs. of posting, the average view per hour is 6 views, or a new view every 10 min. I am satisfied that there is sufficient activity to confirm that there is interest in the blogs out there, and I should just plug on on this fun project of chess blogging. It seems I now have a `hard core` pool of regular viewers..I hope I can keep them both informed, and somewhat entertained, with my `This Is Chess`reality show, for the rest of the tournament!

In the middle, about 6:30 PM, I went out briefly to find a dark roast coffee. I went to the already busy Longueuil subway station…..got my fix at Tim`s and people watched for a while as everyone hurried to work, etc. .I do have a request…….if you are talking to my wife…..don`t let her know I had a chocolate Boston Cream for breakfast! LOL.

Then I returned to `work`.

Template Note:

There are sections of this blog that are a standard “template” which I repeat in each Blog.
The template must be here for any new readers of my Blog.
So I ask my regular readers to be tolerant. If you have read the template part previously, you can skip from “Template Begins” to “Template Ends” (I will alert you immediately after the template if there are any revisions you missed).

Charging, in the Wee Hours, into Monday Morning

The regular readers of my blog (I’ve been doing this since the mid-2000’s) will be familiar with my normal morning routine that I would go through, which I already referred to above. I`ve left the template below as if I was in my office in our Toronto home, though this morning I`m working in the Hotel Sandman Business Centre.

TEMPLATE BEGINS

Victim of Routine

As usual, I then went to my home office ((I am retired + unemployed – life is fine except for my slave-driver company, Canadian Life Consulting Cooperative [Quite a mouthful, but simply put: CLCC], where I must volunteer my work time for free all day long, 24/7!); and fired up my old laptop.

My Daily Personal Project Tasks

1. Check for my e-mails and Fb messages.
2. Check new posts/comments on ChessTalk (CT);
3. Check my Twitter feed to see what had been happening in the world (I follow numerous mainstream media from countries around the world, such as CBC, Toronto Star, National Post, NBC, The New York Times, The Washington Post, France 24, China Daily, Al Jezeera (English), Japan Times, Sputnik News, The Guardian, etc.). I post the most relevant...see below.
4. Fb Project # 1 (My Company's) - My little company (Not legally registered yet) is called, as said above, Canadian Life Consulting Cooperative (CLCC). So I update my company's Fb page, Canadian Life Consulting (CLC) - https://www.facebook.com/Canadian-Li...lting-16406543…/. I do this by checking my Twitter inbox for articles to re-post onto CLC. I then also check my Fb newsfeed and some of my Fb friends timelines for posts to "share".
5. Update one of the discussion groups formed under my company page, called Canadian Life Consulting Cooperative Supporters' Group (Or CLCC Supporters) - https://www.facebook.com/groups/2042495809374373/. I update it by sharing some more discussable of the posts now on the CLC page.
6. Fb Project # 2 (My Own): Update this Fb world events/politics discussion group that I have created here on my own personal Fb account, called PEERS (A Discussion Club of Equals) – https://www.facebook.com/bob.armstrong.9235. I do this by also sharing some of the CLC page posts. But I also share some of my sources' posts directly to this discussion club.
7. I share at least one chess post per day to my Fb chess discussion club, Chess Chat, formed under my personal Fb account - https://www.facebook.com/groups/340524269771672/.
8. When I find them, I share discussable religious posts to my World Religions discussion club Fb Group, Theist Community - https://www.facebook.com/groups/1052227598173591/.
Sometimes these also appear in PEERS.
9. I have another retiree project besides my 2 Facebook Projects.
Chess is a passionate hobby of mine, as you know. But I have never really studied seriously.
But what I do is I enter all my games, and annotate them, to try to learn something - Grandmasters do recommend this often. In addition, I integrate the opening (the first 10 moves) into an opening/defence tree I have for the opening/defence played. The value of this is pretty uncertain, given my inability to remember lines - but I do develop general impressions of how the opening can go.

So on my own time, I go back and forth between the 2 Facebook projects and my chess hobby project.

My 35/25 System

As well, I go back and forth between my routine items above and my own personal life tasks to be done that day. But I have a somewhat unique system for doing this.
Recently I found that I was spending a lot more time on my three retiree projects than my normal life tasks - don't we all spend more time on what we enjoy!
But I was falling behind in "life" while keeping up in the "Fb/chess" projects. So I did have to deal with this issue.
So I came up with the "35/25 System". What this is:
When I am at home, I bite the bullet and I spend 35 min. on my life tasks, which I think of as “working for myself”; I even set the alarm! Then I reward myself with 25 min. on my 3 retiree projects (Facebook [2] & Chess). I try very hard to religiously stop when I am to change phases.
This has actually worked out well....I am still abysmally behind in "Life", but not nearly as much as I used to be! LOL

TEMPLATE ENDS

(Parts II, III & IV below)

Bob A

[Bob Armstrong]

Chess Championship (Saturday, July 20 – Sat., July 27/19) - Blog

Rd. 7 – Thursday, 19/7/25 (6:00 PM)

Bob's Chess Blog # 6 (Part II of 4 parts; see Part I above)

Back to Thursday Morning

I finished at the office at 7:30 AM, handed the office key back in, went upstairs, and crashed until Mario`s 8:30 AM alarm went off.
Mario has picked up the very beginnings of a cold, and is trying to fight it with drinking a lot of liquids and sleeping. He had entered my Rd. 6 Wenesday game….once again……I had a chance to win, and chose the inferior move – the game ended in a draw….the game is below. I updated my `Reminder List` (Very, very erratic memory) – I`m in the process of changing it over from the pad I`d used for years, to a nice little red soft cover book I can carry in my pocket.
Mario then went to sleep, so I went out into the hall and called my wife at our hobby farm…..she is having a good time, and is getting our handyman/friend in to do myriads of things….go for it! Given the Bi-Polar jumping around a bit this last week, she did emphasize that I be cautious, and increase minimally my medication if I felt things were worsening…I`m fine with that and do modify my medication up and down, depending on how I feel. She agreed with my trying for a win in a dead equal position in Rd. 6 on Wednesday, if I had the enthusiasm, given my neutral stance at the start of the game. I said the depression had lifted enough by half way through the game, that I again had some modest desire to play and win. I almost lost, but I drew!! A draw is better than a loss…..fair result….we did both play well, though I did miss a win.
I then tried to call my son who lives here in Montreal…no luck…….as is often the case, I suspect…….dead phone.

The Afternoon

Mario was still sawing it off, so I went back to the salt mines to continue updating my myriad of Facebook projects, and to start the draft for this Thursday Blog # 6.

Contemplation

About 1:30 PM, I took a break to go do my `Contemplation` for a while (Explained last blog). I just paced outside the office, so that if anyone came to use the office, I`d see them and could let them in. Unlike yesterday, I am again quite relaxed, and enjoyed the time spent.

Back to the Salt Mines

Note: As I`ve mentioned, my memory is very erratic and I have a terrible short-term memory. I failed to make any blog notes about this afternoon (Consequently, on Friday when I`m typing this, I have no recollection of much of what happened yesterday)…..so I cannot really fill this section in….just life….happens to me sometimes……

Linner

Mario and I went out to find a new place for dinner – so we just drove around Longueuil a bit and watched for landmarks/signs. We found, about a 1 ½ hr. walk away from the hotel (Thanks to one of the map programs), a barbecue bar….Barbies. It was great….highly recommended both for price and quality……..staff very friendly…interested to find out all about Longueuil hosting the 2^nd COQ.
We got back to the hotel about 5:00 PM. Mario prepped. I was a bit manic, and so I had to sit on my head to try to squash the energy…….and it was best for me not to socialize (I`ll explain another time). So I waited and went into the playing hall a bit late. I can say that I was relieved that the mania started subsiding before I went to play……it is disconcerting trying to play like Tal, doing it badly, and losing…best to avoid that gig if possible.

Rd. 7

I played White against Mario Belanger (1571), who had 3 pts. (I had only 2).

Post-Rd. 7

After our game (My first `win` this tournament), I just watched other games………I was too tired to work on the desktop…..I did get all the results for our section, before I went up to the room, and hit the sack at 11:00 PM.

My Prior Round Games
Rd.6
[Event "COQ 2019"]
[Site "Longueuil, Québec"]
[Date "19/7/24"]
[Round "6"]
[White "Armstrong, Robert (Bob) J. (1633)"]
[Black "Malloy, Francis (1513)"]
[Result "1/2"]
[Annotator "Houdini 6.02 Pro x64-pext (90m)"]
[PlyCount "129"]

{ D06: Queen's Gambit: Symmetrical and Baltic Defences} 1. d4 d5 2.
Nf3 Nf6 3. e3 Bf5 4. c4 e6 {last book move} 5. Bd3 (5. Nc3 Nc6 6. a3 $11) 5.. Bxd3 6. Qxd3 c5 7. O-O Nc6 8. a3 {Secures b4} (8. b3 cxd4 9. exd4 Be7 $11) 8... Be7 9. dxc5 Bxc5 10. b4 {White threatens to win material: b4xc5} Be7 11. c5 {White wins space} (11. Nc3 dxc4 12. Qxc4 a6 $11) 11... O-O 12. Bb2 Ne4 (12...a5 13. Nd4 $11) 13. Nbd2 Nxd2 14. Qxd2 Bf6 (14... a6 15. Rfc1 $14) 15. Rfc1 (15. b5 Bxb2 16. Qxb2 Ne7 $14) 15... Bxb2 {Black forks: a1+c1} 16. Qxb2 a6 17. a4 a5 (17... Qf6 18. Qxf6 gxf6 19. Rab1 $14) 18. bxa5 (18. b5 $142 Nb4 19. Qd2 $16) 18... Nxa5 $11 19. Qb4 Qc7 20. Nd4 Nc6 {Black threatens to win material:
Nc6xb4} 21. Qb3 Nxd4 (21... Rfb8 22. h3 $11) 22. exd4 Rfb8 23. Rcb1 Ra6 24. Qb5 (24. g3 h6 $14) 24... Qc6 (24... e5 25. dxe5 Rc6 26. Rc1 $11) 25. h3 h6 26. a5 Kf8 $4 (26... Rba8 $142 $14 {is the best chance}) 27. Qxc6 $18 Rxc6 28. Rb6 ( 28. a6 $142 {and the rest is a matter of technique} Rc7 29. Rb6 $18) 28... Rxb6 $11 29. cxb6 {White has a new strong pawn: b6} Rc8 30. a6 bxa6 31. Rxa6 { White has a new passed pawn: b6} Rb8 32. Kf1 Ke8 33. Ke2 Kd7 34. Ra7+ Ke8 35. Ra6 {Twofold repetition –} Kd7 {Black makes draw offer - not accepted!?} 36. f4 (36. Ra7+ $142 $5 {would allow White to play on} Ke8 37. Ra6 $11) 36... Kc6 $17 37. Ra7 Rb7 38. Ra8 Kxb6 39. g4 Kc6 40. Rd8 $2 (40. f5 $5 $17) 40... Rb2+ 41. Kf3 (41. Ke1 Rb4 42. Rg8 Rxd4 $19) 41... Rb3+ $19 42. Kg2 (42. Ke2 Rxh3 43. Rf8 Rg3 $19) 42... Rb4 43. f5 $2 (43. Kf3 $142 Rxd4 44. h4 Rd3+ 45. Kg2 $19) 43... Rxd4 44. fxe6 (44. Rf8 exf5 45. gxf5 $19) 44... fxe6 45. Rg8 (45. Re8 {is the last straw} Kd6 46. Kf2 Rd2+ 47. Kf3 Rd3+ 48. Kg2 $19) 45... Rf4 46. Rxg7 Rf6 (46... d4 47. Re7 Kd6 48. Re8 $19) 47. h4 Kd6 48. g5 hxg5 49. hxg5 Rf8 50. g6 Ke5 (50... Rf5 $142 $19 {ends the debate}) 51. Rf7 $11 {'the rook is the rook!'} Rg8 52.
g7 Ke4 53. Kf2 e5 54. Ke2 Kd4 55. Kd2 e4 {Black gains space} 56. Re7 Ra8 57. Ke2 Ra2+ 58. Kf1 Ra8 59. Rf7 Rg8 60. Ke2 Kc3 61. Ke3 Kc4 62. Rc7+ Kb5 63. Kd4 {White threatens to win material: Kd4xd5} Kb6 {Black threatens to win material: Kb6xc7} 64. Rf7 Kc6 65. Rf6+ {White offers draw - accepted} *

1/2

(See Parts III & IV below)

Bob

[Bob Armstrong]

Chess Championship (Saturday, July 20 – Sat., July 27/19) - Blog

Rd. 7 – Thursday, 19/7/25 (6:00 PM)

Bob's Chess Blog # 6 (Part III of 4 parts; see Parts I & II above)

U 1800 Section Chess Report on Rd. 7 (Thursday, July 25, 2019).

My U 1800 Section

I am rated 1633 (FQE). I am ranked # 17 out of 33 players (In the middle third).

Rating Spread

1700`s – 4 (Favourites)
1600’s – 15 (my rating is here)
1500’s – 12
1400’s – 1
1300’s – 0
1200`s - 1

Total - 33

U 1800 Standings After Rd. 7

Leaders: 7

1^st/4^th - 5.5/6 pts. – Guennadi Kozlov (1691); Haruaki Omichi (1674); Geffrard Morinvil (1667); Alessio Di Matteo (1639).

5^th/7^th – 4.5/6 pts. – Marcel Laurin (1619); Dominic Boileau (1603); Junior Boy Hugo Guillemette (1503 – 8 y.o.!).

Favourites/Dark Horses (Non-leaders): 12

4/6 pts. – Benoit Villeneuve (1762 – top seed); Abderaouf Sekki (1740 – 2^nd seed); Gerard Patrice (1715 – 4^th seed); Luc Gauthier (1656); Jeremie Cassista (1648); Danyel Haines (1591); Eric Liu (1421).

3.5/6 pts. - Maximo Alcantra Jr. (1726 – 3^rd seed); Patrice Ion Nica (1681); Ming Yu Xi (1647); Junior Girl Rachel Zihan Wang (1556);

3/6 pts. - Roger Gendron (1566).

It is my experience that Favourites/Dark Horses who may not start well, often end near the top…… this generally seems to be happening!! Watch where they end up in the final standings after R. 9.

My Round 7 Game

King`s Indian Defence (Samish Line)
[Event "COQ 2019"]
[Site "Longueuil, Québec"]
[Date "19/7/24"]
[Round "7"]
[White "Armstrong, Robert (Bob) J.(1633)"]
[Black "Boulanger, Mario (1571)"]
[Result "1/2"]
[Annotator "Houdini 6.02 Pro x64-pext (120m)"]
[PlyCount "61"]

{E87: King's Indian: Sämisch: 6...e5 7 d5} 1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 g6 3.
Nc3 Bg7 4. e4 d6 5. f3 O-O 6. Be3 e5 7. d5 a5 {last book move} 8. g4 Nbd7 (8...c6 9. Qd2 $16) 9. Nge2 {Black's piece can't move: c8} (9. Qd2 h5 10. h3 Nc5 $16) 9... Nc5 (9... h5 10. h3 $16) 10. Ng3 $16 Ne8 11. h4 h6 (11... Bf6 $5 12. g5 Be7 $16) 12. Qd2 $18 Kh7 13. Be2 f5 $2 (13... Bd7 $142 $18) 14. exf5 gxf5 15. gxf5 (15. O-O-O $142 {might be the shorter path} Qe7 $18) 15... Nf6 $2 (15...Bxf5 16. O-O-O $18) 16. Nce4 (16. O-O-O $142 {and White can already relax} Rg8 $18) 16... b6 (16... Ncxe4 17. fxe4 Rg8 $18) 17. Ng5+ $1 {Double attack: f6/h7} Kh8 (17... hxg5 18. hxg5+ {Passed pawn Double attack}) 18. Ne6 Bxe6 19. dxe6 (19. fxe6 {seems even better} c6 20. Bxh6 Bxh6 21. Qxh6+ Nh7 $18) 19... Kh7 (19... Rg8 {hardly improves anything} 20. Bxh6 Bxh6 21. Qxh6+ Nh7 22. Ne4 $18)20. O-O-O Qe8 21. Rdg1 Rg8 (21... Qc6 {does not save the day} 22. Nf1 Rg8 23. Rg6 Nxe6 24. fxe6 Kxg6 25. Bd3+ e4 26. fxe4 $18) 22. Bd3 c6 (22... Nxd3+ {doesn't change the outcome of the game} 23. Qxd3 b5 24. Ne4 $18) 23. Ne4 (23.Bxc5 bxc5 24. Ne4 Ra7 25. Rxg7+ Kxg7 26. Nxf6 Kxf6 27. Qxh6+ Ke7 28. Qh7+ Kf6 29. Qxa7 Rg2 $18) 23... Nxd3+ (23... Ncxe4 {desperation} 24. fxe4 Bf8 $18) 24. Qxd3 Nxe4 (24... Qh5 {does not help much} 25. Rg6 Nxe4 26. fxe4 $18) 25. Qxe4 Bf6 (25... d5 {cannot undo what has already been done} 26. Qc2 e4 27. fxe4 $18) 26. Bg5 (26. Rxg8 Kxg8 27. Rg1+ Kf8 $18) 26... Kg7 (26... d5 {is not much help} 27. cxd5 cxd5 28. Qxd5 $18) 27. Bd2+ Kh7 28. Qe3 (28. Rxg8 $142 {keeps an even firmer grip} Qxg8 29. Qe3 Qf8 $18) 28... Rxg1+ (28... Qh5 {otherwise it's curtains at once} 29. Qxb6 Qxf5 30. Qb7+ Kh8 $18) 29. Rxg1 Bg7 (29... Qh5 30. Rg6 Bg7 31. Qxb6 Qxf5 32. Rxg7+ Kxg7 33. Qb7+ Kg6 34. Qxa8 Qxe6 35. Qxc6 Qe7 $18) 30. f6 Bf8 (30... Qg6 {doesn't change anything anymore} 31. Rxg6 Kxg6 32. fxg7 Kxg7 33. Qxh6+ Kg8 34. Qg6+ Kh8 35. Bg5 Rf8 36. e7 Rxf3 37. e8=Q+ Rf8 38. Qxf8#) 31. e7 (31. f7 Qxf7 32. exf7 Bg7 33. Qe4+ Kh8 34. Qg6 Rg8 35. fxg8=Q+ Kxg8 36. Qxg7#) *

1-0

My Score

3/7 pts.: Win: 1 (Rd. 7); Draws: 2 (Rds. 2 & 6); Losses: 3 (Rds. 1, 3 & 4); Director`s 1 pt. Bye: 1 (Rd. 5)

My Opponents' & My Scores

4/6 pts. – Abderaouf Sekki (1740 – 2^nd seed) – I lost in Rd. 1.
3.5/6 pts. - Maximo Alcantra Jr. (1726 – 3^rd seed) – I drew in Rd. 2
3/6 pts. – Me (1633)

• Mario Belanger (1571) – I won in Rd. 7.
• Aldo Lelievre (1523) – I lost in Rd. 4.
• Junior Boy Deren Mai (1523) – I lost in Rd. 3

2/6 pts. - Francis Malloy (1513) – I drew in Rd. 6.

Other Less Important Sections – Open

If I have time, I also report very minimally on the Open Section (Though I know all class players in Quebec & the Rest of Canada really are most interested in the U 1800 section!)

Leaders:4

1^st– 6.5/7 pts. - GM Reynaldo Vera Gonzalez-Quevedo (2424 – Cuba).

2^nd/4^th - 5.5/7 pts. – GM Alexandre Le Siege (2500 – Quebec, Canada); GM Thomas Roussel-Roozmon (2463 – Quebec, Canada); WIM Junior Girl Maili-Jade Ouellet (2079).

Favourites/Dark Horses (Non-leaders): 6

5/7 pts. - GM Bator Sambuev (2503 – Quebec, Canada); IM David Cummings (2340); Shawn Rodrigue-Lemieux (2257).

4.5/7 pts. – FM Olivier-Kenta Chiku-Ratte (2364); GM Luis Manuel Perez Rodriguez (2348 - Cuba); IM Raymond Kaufman (2301); Hughes Masse ((2168); Valentin Prahov (2055); Woman Player WFM Alexandra Botez (2040).

4/7 pts. - Dario Leonel Martinez Mulet (2123); CM Taira Tyler Tanaka ((2109); Ananda Saha (2059).

Full Results

See Chess-Results website (Canada): http://chess-results.com/fed.aspx?lan=1&fed=CAN

(See Part IV below)

Bob A

[Bob Armstrong]

Chess Championship (Saturday, July 20 – Sat., July 27/19) - Blog

Rd. 7 – Thursday, 19/7/25 (6:00 PM)

Bob's Chess Blog # 6 (Part IV of 4 parts; see Parts I, II & III above)

TEMPLATE BEGINS

Bob's Blog – Some History

For a number of years now, I have been posting my chess blog:

i) on my personal Facebook Account for my almost 850 Fb friends from around the world (in English): https://www.facebook.com/bob.armstrong.9235;
ii) sometimes on the national Canadian English chess discussion board, Chess Talk [CT] (https://forum.chesstalk.com/…/chesstalk-canada-s-chess-disc…);
iii) occasionally on other chess websites, such as that of FQE (Province of Quebec's Chess Association). That time the blog was posted in both French and English.

More recently I also have been "re-posting" my Fb blog:

i) on my Fb chess discussion group, Chess Chat - A Project of Chess Companions of Caissa (https://www.facebook.com/groups/340524269771672/);
ii) my Scarborough CC tournaments Fb Blog to SCC's Fb Page (URL above)
iii) my Annex CC tournaments Fb blog to ACC's Fb Group (https://www.facebook.com/groups/172335039452033/);

Henry Lam (Aka Dark Knight), the recently new owner of CT, and I have an agreement (From the summer of 2018) that I will re-post my Fb Blogs on CT for both my chess club official tournaments, and my non-club weekend (Sometimes longer; sometimes shorter) tournaments, in which I play between Summer 2018 and Summer 2019.

After that, Henry and I can then renew our agreement for another year if we both so wish.

So, under this agreement, most recently I have been re-posting my current Scarborough CC and Annex CC tournaments. My future non-club weekend blogs to and including Summer 2019 will be (Given my current schedule - from time to time, though, my life schedule may change so that I fit in a tournament not on my schedule):

1. The 2018 Hart House Holidays Open – Toronto (Prior to Christmas - Dec. 14-16/18) - Blogged;
2. The 2019 Hart House Reading Week Open – Toronto (February 16-18 – Only one short blog – having manic phase).
3. The 2019 Quebec Open – Longueuil (Next to Montreal) (July 21-7).
4. The 2019 Toronto Open (Aug. 31 – Sept. 2)

The National Canadian French Chess Discussion Board

Henri Hughes, a member of both the national English and French chess discussion boards (Chess Talk; Parlons Échecs), volunteers, subject to demands of his school studies, to translate my blogs into French, and post them to Parlons Échecs, also owned by Henry Lam. Thanks from all to Henri for his volunteer effort.

The Blog Focus

I mainly focus on the section I am playing in (Has been U 2000, U 1900 or U 1800). I feel that these class sections are often not covered by chess media, and yet, the bulk of chess tournament players are in the classes under 1900. And many of my class viewers have actually played players about whom I am blogging (Ones I play and ones with whom I may socialize during the tournament, who then are mentioned in the Blog). So this adds a bit more interest for them.

I do also generally cover (Bare Bones) the top section standings; but I have to have been able to get the results before the Blog goes to press. I sometimes will cover also the lower sections, if I have the results. For both, of course, it can be a matter of the time available (I am often doing my Blog in the wee hours of the morning).

I do hope my blogs will continue to provide a window onto class tournament chess, and what THIS chess player does in the day of club tournaments, and before and between rounds for weekend tournaments (A bit of a reality show - bits of my personal life).

I know many other chess players approach tournaments quite differently than I do (E.g. - study!), and so one cannot generalize from what I do.

Blog Feedback

Over the years, and in these more recent blogs, I have had generally positive feedback on my blogging, on both of my own Fb Accounts, the SCC & ACC Fb sites, and on CT.

It has been said that my writing style is easy to read, factual, and often entertaining. It is a find for all us "nosy" chess players!

Thanks to all those who have supported my Blogging on various sites, and kept encouraging me to continue.

TEMPLATE ENDS

Invitation

I am most happy to interact with readers re anything about which I have posted.....so react, comment, reply, post, etc. - both favourable comments and constructive criticism....I will do my best to respond to everyone, so long as I am where I have access to the internet.

And if some of the players, or non-players, wish to post something to supplement the blog, you are encouraged to do so.

So jump in with both feet, and we'll all enjoy the blogging adventure!

Bob A

[Bob Armstrong]

COQ/Quebec Open Chess Championship (Saturday, July 20 – Sat., July 27/19) - Blog

Rd. 8 – Friday, 19/7/26 (6:00 PM)

Bob's Chess Blog # 7 (Part I of 4 parts)
(See Knight Logo below)

Tournament

Name: Championnat ouvert d’echecs du Quebec (COQ)/Quebec Open Chess Championship
Dates: July 20 – 27/19
Rounds: 9
Sections: 5: Open (Any level player); U 2000; U 1800; \U 1600; U 1400.
Registrations: 188 registrants: Open: 52; U 2000: 37; U 1800: 32; U 1600 - 30; U 1400: 37
Playing Up: In Quebec, all sections are truly “open” – you can play as long as you are not at or over the ceiling rating; no playing up fee.
Time Control: 40/90 + 30 (30 sec. increment from move 1)

Blog Note:

This Blog, here on my personal Facebook page, is directly re-posted a few other places - so references here refer to this Fb platform.

The Day of Rd. 8 (Friday, 19/7/26)

I`ve been here at the Sandman Hotel (Tournament location), in Longueuil, Quebec, since 4:30 PM, Friday, July 19. This past week has passed so quickly, and happily, that it is just a blur. I am sharing the room with my Toronto friend, Mario Moran-Venegas (U 2000 section ). He says `Hi` to all his friends at Strategy Games in Toronto, Ontario. He`s just wondering why he`s on such a short lease? I told him Francis would explain everything when he got back to Toronto!
I do have one concern…..I`ve been getting a lot of e-mails and telephone calls asking for more in the blog about Mario……..he seems to be a rising star! I do have concerns that he may have designs on taking top spot in the blog. I`m open to any advice on relationships, as to how I deal with this somewhat delicate situation with my blog research assistant. Mérci.
I is not unusual for me in weekend and longer tournaments, to sleep short and erratically (I have to be careful; sleep deficit and Bi-Polar Disorder do not go well together). But today I awoke at 6:00 AM (Went to bed Thursday night at 11:00 PM!). It is really helpful to ward off a mania phase of my Bi-Polar Disorder to get a long 7 hr. sleep.
So I dressed, and went to search for a dark roast. The express line at Tim`s was closed (Sigh) and the regular line up was almost back out the door of the subway at that time of morning. But I persevered. I got a Boston Cream for breakfast and people-watched for a while. I give gratitude to the Universe, and all the powers that be, that I am old, decrepit, and RETIRED! Keep paying my pensions people!!
Then I settled into my office:

1. finishing and posting the Thursday Blog # 6 and updating my standings list with Chess-Results.
2. Entered into my normal daily routine (See Template below).
3. Checked the Stats on my Wed., Blog # 5 – in the first 24 hrs. of posting, I was pleasantly surprised to see that there were 4.5 views per hour on ChessTalk – this is better than one view every 15 min., for a whole day! I am pleased that many are finding my blog informative and interesting enough to spend some of their time scrolling through 3 or 4 screens of my chess reporting. But you realize that with this encouragement, I`ll be inflicting myself on you all again during the Toronto Open, on the Labour Day long weekend! LOL

About 8:30 AM, I needed a break, and so went out into the hallway to contemplate for a while…….I expected Mario soon to go to breakfast together. My friend, Eric Van Dusen (2000 section) showed up to use the desktop – volunteering to help out in some gig in Ottawa. Then in the hallway I met Marcel Laurin from my section. He does many things, and one of them today was being a Beta Reader for a dancer/writer (Quite accomplished) re an article she had written. We found we had a mutual interest in Cuba (My son-in-law is from there) and a mutual Toronto chess friend, David Cohen.

Template Note:

There are sections of this blog that are a standard “template” which I repeat in each Blog.
The template must be here for any new readers of my Blog.
So I ask my regular readers to be tolerant. If you have read the template part previously, you can skip from “Template Begins” to “Template Ends” (I will alert you immediately after the template if there are any revisions you missed).

Continuing Saturday Morning

The regular readers of my blog (I’ve been doing this since the mid-2000’s) will be familiar with my normal morning routine that I would go through, which I already referred to above. I`ve left the template below as if I was in my office in our Toronto home, though this morning I`m, as usual this week, working in the Hotel Sandman Business Centre.

(Parts II,II & IV below)

Bob A

[Bob Armstrong]

COQ/Quebec Open Chess Championship (Saturday, July 20 – Sat., July 27/19) - Blog

Rd. 8 – Friday, 19/7/26 (6:00 PM)

Bob's Chess Blog # 7 (Part II of 4 parts)

TEMPLATE BEGINS

Victim of Routine

As usual, I then went to my home office ((I am retired + unemployed – life is fine except for my slave-driver company, Canadian Life Consulting Cooperative [Quite a mouthful, but simply put: CLCC], where I must volunteer my work time for free all day long, 24/7!); and fired up my old laptop.

My Daily Personal Project Tasks

1. Check for my e-mails and Fb messages.
2. Check new posts/comments on ChessTalk (CT);
3. Check my Twitter feed to see what had been happening in the world (I follow numerous mainstream media from countries around the world, such as CBC, Toronto Star, National Post, NBC, The New York Times, The Washington Post, France 24, China Daily, Al Jezeera (English), Japan Times, Sputnik News, The Guardian, etc.). I post the most relevant...see below.
4. Fb Project # 1 (My Company's) - My little company (Not legally registered yet) is called, as said above, Canadian Life Consulting Cooperative (CLCC). So I update my company's Fb page, Canadian Life Consulting (CLC) - https://www.facebook.com/Canadian-Li...lting-16406543…/. I do this by checking my Twitter inbox for articles to re-post onto CLC. I then also check my Fb newsfeed and some of my Fb friends timelines for posts to "share".
5. Update one of the discussion groups formed under my company page, called Canadian Life Consulting Cooperative Supporters' Group (Or CLCC Supporters) - https://www.facebook.com/groups/2042495809374373/. I update it by sharing some more discussable of the posts now on the CLC page.
6. Fb Project # 2 (My Own): Update this Fb world events/politics discussion group that I have created here on my own personal Fb account, called PEERS (A Discussion Club of Equals) – https://www.facebook.com/bob.armstrong.9235. I do this by also sharing some of the CLC page posts. But I also share some of my sources' posts directly to this discussion club.
7. I share at least one chess post per day to my Fb chess discussion club, Chess Chat, formed under my personal Fb account - https://www.facebook.com/groups/340524269771672/.
8. When I find them, I share discussable religious posts to my World Religions discussion club Fb Group, Theist Community - https://www.facebook.com/groups/1052227598173591/.
Sometimes these also appear in PEERS.
9. I have another retiree project besides my 2 Facebook Projects.
Chess is a passionate hobby of mine, as you know. But I have never really studied seriously.
But what I do is I enter all my games, and annotate them, to try to learn something - Grandmasters do recommend this often. In addition, I integrate the opening (the first 10 moves) into an opening/defence tree I have for the opening/defence played. The value of this is pretty uncertain, given my inability to remember lines - but I do develop general impressions of how the opening can go.

So on my own time, I go back and forth between the 2 Facebook projects and my chess hobby project.

My 35/25 System

As well, I go back and forth between my routine items above and my own personal life tasks to be done that day. But I have a somewhat unique system for doing this.
Recently I found that I was spending a lot more time on my three retiree projects than my normal life tasks - don't we all spend more time on what we enjoy!
But I was falling behind in "life" while keeping up in the "Fb/chess" projects. So I did have to deal with this issue.
So I came up with the "35/25 System". What this is:
When I am at home, I bite the bullet and I spend 35 min. on my life tasks, which I think of as “working for myself”; I even set the alarm! Then I reward myself with 25 min. on my 3 retiree projects (Facebook [2] & Chess). I try very hard to religiously stop when I am to change phases.
This has actually worked out well....I am still abysmally behind in "Life", but not nearly as much as I used to be! LOL

TEMPLATE ENDS

Continuing Friday Morning

At 9:30 AM, Mario came down – he had grabbed some more sleep since he was trying to get rid of a cold he`d developed. Marcel had gone to get something in his hotel room to show me, but I missed him since Mario and I went to breakfast. Also one of the chess players wanted to use the desktop for a while, so I had put all my stuff to the side.
At 10:30 AM we returned to the hotel. I called my wife at our hobby farm – she was on a tear re a new garden project – goji berries and sea buckthorn berries …..7 plants…..needed new garden…….had gotten in a ½ dump truck load of triple mix (top soil, compost and peat moss); had our handyman in to dig the spots for them to go…..no time to talk……busy……what am I?? Chopped Liver?……no use….bye! No respect…..it`s what happens, people, after 48 continuous years of monogamous marriage!
At 11:00 AM I went back down to the office. The other chess player was near the end….I told him no rush since I had no agenda that day…I`d just contemplate in the hallway …..
When he finished, I settled in again…….then Mario showed up with the memory stick with my Rd. 7 game, lightly engine-analyzed, and I put it on the desktop for future entry into this blog. Mario went back up to the room to do some opponent prep.
Afternoon Friday
From noon, I worked on my Thursday Blog # 6, and alternated with my general daily routine. At 2:00 PM, I again needed a break and was going to go contemplate for a while. But I had earlier e-mailed my chess friend, and he had come over to respond, while waiting for someone at the subway. We chatted about the rising water in Lake Huron and Georgian Bay on the Ontario shoreline, some business stuff, etc. Then my New York chess friend showed up and he joined us. Then they both left to go do their own things, and I went back and finished the Thursday Blog # 6 and got it posted.
Then Mario showed up around 4:00 PM, and I finished the blog, and we went for dinner in the subway food court…I got an A & W; Mario went to Mon Ami Express, and got a nice Korean dinner at a very reasonable price. Then we returned to the hotel room to await the 8^th round.
Round 8
I played Guy Brunet (1578) and was black. It was the Dutch Defence which I claim to know………I dropped the exchange in the opening, and got doubled pawns in the process, and never got back in the game (You can see the disaster below). Mario and I watched the finish of the top games until the very end. I was able to get the full post-rd. 8 standings for the U 1800 and the Open before going upstairs to bed. I did some preliminary packing, and Mario entered our Rd. 8 games. We got to bed at 1:30 AM this morning.

(See Parts III & IV below)

Bob A

[Bob Armstrong]

COQ/Quebec Open Chess Championship (Saturday, July 20 – Sat., July 27/19) - Blog

Rd. 8 – Friday, 19/7/26 (6:00 PM)

Bob's Chess Blog # 7 (Part III of 4 parts; see Pars I & II above)

My Prior Round Games
Rd.7
A King`s Indian (Samish Line)
[Event "COQ 2019"]
[Site "Longueuil, Québec"]
[Date "19/7/24"]
[Round "7"]
[White "Armstrong, Robert (Bob) J.(1633)"]
[Black "Boulanger, Mario (1571)"]
[Result "1/2"]
[Annotator "Houdini 6.02 Pro x64-pext (120m)"]
[PlyCount "61"]

{E87: King's Indian: Sämisch: 6...e5 7 d5} 1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 g6 3.
Nc3 Bg7 4. e4 d6 5. f3 O-O 6. Be3 e5 7. d5 a5 {last book move} 8. g4 Nbd7 (8...c6 9. Qd2 $16) 9. Nge2 {Black's piece can't move: c8} (9. Qd2 h5 10. h3 Nc5 $16) 9... Nc5 (9... h5 10. h3 $16) 10. Ng3 $16 Ne8 11. h4 h6 (11... Bf6 $5 12. g5 Be7 $16) 12. Qd2 $18 Kh7 13. Be2 f5 $2 (13... Bd7 $142 $18) 14. exf5 gxf5 15. gxf5 (15. O-O-O $142 {might be the shorter path} Qe7 $18) 15... Nf6 $2 (15...Bxf5 16. O-O-O $18) 16. Nce4 (16. O-O-O $142 {and White can already relax} Rg8 $18) 16... b6 (16... Ncxe4 17. fxe4 Rg8 $18) 17. Ng5+ $1 {Double attack: f6/h7} Kh8 (17... hxg5 18. hxg5+ {Passed pawn Double attack}) 18. Ne6 Bxe6 19. dxe6 (19. fxe6 {seems even better} c6 20. Bxh6 Bxh6 21. Qxh6+ Nh7 $18) 19... Kh7 (19... Rg8 {hardly improves anything} 20. Bxh6 Bxh6 21. Qxh6+ Nh7 22. Ne4 $18)20. O-O-O Qe8 21. Rdg1 Rg8 (21... Qc6 {does not save the day} 22. Nf1 Rg8 23. Rg6 Nxe6 24. fxe6 Kxg6 25. Bd3+ e4 26. fxe4 $18) 22. Bd3 c6 (22... Nxd3+ {doesn't change the outcome of the game} 23. Qxd3 b5 24. Ne4 $18) 23. Ne4 (23.Bxc5 bxc5 24. Ne4 Ra7 25. Rxg7+ Kxg7 26. Nxf6 Kxf6 27. Qxh6+ Ke7 28. Qh7+ Kf6 29. Qxa7 Rg2 $18) 23... Nxd3+ (23... Ncxe4 {desperation} 24. fxe4 Bf8 $18) 24. Qxd3 Nxe4 (24... Qh5 {does not help much} 25. Rg6 Nxe4 26. fxe4 $18) 25. Qxe4 Bf6 (25... d5 {cannot undo what has already been done} 26. Qc2 e4 27. fxe4 $18) 26. Bg5 (26. Rxg8 Kxg8 27. Rg1+ Kf8 $18) 26... Kg7 (26... d5 {is not much help} 27. cxd5 cxd5 28. Qxd5 $18) 27. Bd2+ Kh7 28. Qe3 (28. Rxg8 $142 {keeps an even firmer grip} Qxg8 29. Qe3 Qf8 $18) 28... Rxg1+ (28... Qh5 {otherwise it's curtains at once} 29. Qxb6 Qxf5 30. Qb7+ Kh8 $18) 29. Rxg1 Bg7 (29... Qh5 30. Rg6 Bg7 31. Qxb6 Qxf5 32. Rxg7+ Kxg7 33. Qb7+ Kg6 34. Qxa8 Qxe6 35. Qxc6 Qe7 $18) 30. f6 Bf8 (30... Qg6 {doesn't change anything anymore} 31. Rxg6 Kxg6 32. fxg7 Kxg7 33. Qxh6+ Kg8 34. Qg6+ Kh8 35. Bg5 Rf8 36. e7 Rxf3 37. e8=Q+ Rf8 38. Qxf8#) 31. e7 (31. f7 Qxf7 32. exf7 Bg7 33. Qe4+ Kh8 34. Qg6 Rg8 35. fxg8=Q+ Kxg8 36. Qxg7#) *

1-0
U 1800 Section Chess Report on Rd. 8 (Friday, July 26, 2019).
My U 1800 Section
I am rated 1633 (FQE). I am ranked # 17 out of 33 players (In the middle third).
Rating Spread
1700`s – 4 (Favourites)
1600’s – 15 (my rating is here)
1500’s – 12
1400’s – 1
1300’s – 0
1200`s - 1
Total - 33
U 1800 Standings After Rd. 7
Leaders:6
1^st – 6.5/8 pts. - Dominic Boileau (1603).
2^nd/3^rd– 6/8 pts. - Guennadi Kozlov (1691); Alessio Di Matteo (1639).
4^th /6^th- 5.5/8 pts. – Haruaki Omichi (1674); Geffrard Morinvil (1667); Marcel Laurin (1619).
Favourites/Dark Horses (Non-leaders):
5/8 pts. – Maximo Alcantra Jr. (1726 – 3^rd seed); Patrice Gerard (1715 - # 4 seed); Junior Boy Jeremie Cassista (1648).
4.5 pts. - Abderaouf Sekki (1740 – 2^nd seed); Ming Yu Xi (1647); Junior Girl Rachel Zihan Wang (1556); Junior Boy Hugo Guillemette (1503 – 8 y.o.!).
4/6 pts. – Benoit Villeneuve (1762 – top seed); Roger Gendron (1566); .Luc Gauthier (1656); Eric Liu (1421).
3.5/6 pts. - Patrice Ion Nica (1681); Danyel Haines (1591);
It is my experience that Favourites/Dark Horses who may not start well, often end near the top…… not this tournament…….none of our 4 seeds are among the 6 leaders!!

(See Part IV below)

Bob A

[Bob Armstrong]

COQ/Quebec Open Chess Championship (Saturday, July 20 – Sat., July 27/19) - Blog

Rd. 8 – Friday, 19/7/26 (6:00 PM)

Bob's Chess Blog # 7 (Part IV of 4 parts; see Parts I, II & III above)

Rd. 8 Game
[Event "COQ 2019"]
[Site "Longueuil, Québec"]
[Date "19/726"]
[Round "8"]
[White "Guy Brunet (1578)"]
[Black "Armstrong, Robert (Bob) J."]
[Result "1-0"]
[Annotator "Houdini 6.02 Pro x64-pext (120m)"]
[PlyCount "97"]

{[%mdl 8192] A80: Dutch Defence: Unusual White second moves A80: Dutch Defence:Unusual White second moves} 1. d4 f5 2. Nf3 Nf6 {last book move} 3. c3 e6 4.Bg5 Be7 5. Nbd2 {last book move} Ne4 (5... O-O 6. e3 $11) 6. Bxe7 Qxe7 7. e3 d5 8. Ne5 (8. Rc1 $142 $14) 8... Nd7 $2 (8... O-O $142 $11 {and Black hangs on})9. Qh5+ $16 Kf8 $2 (9... g6 $142 10. Nxg6 Qf7 $16) 10. Ng6+ $18 hxg6 11. Qxh8+Kf7 12. Nxe4 dxe4 13. Qh3 (13. g4 {and White can already relax} Qe8 14. Qh3 Qe7 $18) 13... Nb6 (13... Nf6 14. Be2 $18) 14. f3 (14. O-O-O Bd7 $18) 14... exf3 (14... e5 15. O-O-O exf3 16. Qxf3 $18) 15. Qxf3 c5 (15... e5 16. O-O-O $18) 16.Bd3 (16. O-O-O {keeps an even firmer grip} cxd4 17. exd4 Qd8 $18) 16... Qc7 (16... cxd4 17. exd4 Qc7 18. O-O $18) 17. O-O (17. dxc5 {makes it even easier
for White} Na4 18. O-O-O Nxc5 $18) 17... Bd7 18. Qf4 (18. e4 $5 Kg8 $18) 18...Qxf4 19. Rxf4 cxd4 20. exd4 Nd5 21. Rf2 Bc6 22. Re1 Rh8 (22... Nf6 23. Rfe2 Bd5 24. c4 $18) 23. a3 (23. Bc4 g5 $18) 23... Nf6 (23... Rd8 24. Bc4 $18) 24. Rfe2 Ne4 25. Bxe4 Bxe4 26. Rxe4 fxe4 27. Rxe4 Rh5 (27... Kf6 28. h3 $18) 28. h3 (28.Re5 {seems even better} Rh8 $18) 28... Rf5 (28... Rb5 29. Re2 $18) 29. Re2 (29.Re5 Kf6 30. Rxf5+ gxf5 $18) 29... Ke7 30. g3 (30. Re5 Rf6 $18) 30... Kd6 (30...Rf3 31. Kg2 Rd3 32. h4 $18) 31. Kg2 $18 b5 (31... Rb5 32. g4 $18) 32. b3 (32.g4 $5 Rd5 $18) 32... a5 33. g4 (33. c4 $142 a4 34. c5+ Kd5 35. b4 $18) 33...
Rd5 $2 (33... Rf7 $142 $5 $16) 34. Re4 $18 e5 $4 {the final mistake, not that it matters anymore} (34... a4 35. bxa4 bxa4 $18) 35. Rxe5 Rxe5 36. dxe5+ Kxe5 37. Kf3 a4 (37... Kd5 {doesn't do any good} 38. Ke3 g5 39. Kd3 Kc5 40. c4 bxc4+ 41. bxc4 Kd6 42. Kd4 Kc6 43. c5 Kd7 44. Kd5 a4 45. Kc4 Kc6 46. Kb4 g6 47. Kc4 Kc7 48. Kb5 Kd7 49. Kxa4 Kc6 50. Kb4 Kd7 51. a4 Kc6 52. a5 Kd7 53. Kb5 Ke8 54.a6 Kd7 55. a7 Ke8 56. c6 Kf8 57. a8=Q+ Ke7 58. c7 Kd6 59. c8=Q Ke5 60. Qc3+ Ke6 61. Qe8+ Kd5 62. Qce5#) 38. bxa4 bxa4 39. Ke3 Kd5 40. Kd3 g5 41. c4+ Ke5 (41...Kc5 {does not win a prize} 42. Kc3 g6 43. Kd3 Kd6 44. Kd4 Kc6 45. c5 Kd7 46.Kc4 Kc6 47. Kb4 Kd7 48. Kxa4 Kc6 49. Kb4 Kd7 50. Kb5 Ke8 51. a4 Kd7 52. a5 Ke8
53. c6 Kf8 54. a6 Ke7 55. a7 Kd6 56. a8=Q Ke7 57. c7 Kd6 58. c8=Q Ke5 59. Qc3+ Ke6 60. Qe8+ Kd5 61. Qd2#) 42. Kc3 Kf4 (42... Ke6 {doesn't get the bull off the ice} 43. Kb4 Kd6 44. Kxa4 Kc5 45. Kb3 Kc6 46. Kb4 Kd6 47. c5+ Ke7 48. Kb5 Kd7 49. a4 Kc7 50. c6 Kb8 51. a5 Ka7 52. a6 Kb8 53. Kb6 Kc8 54. c7 g6 55. a7 Kd7 56. a8=Q Ke6 57. c8=Q+ Ke5 58. Qc3+ Ke6 59. Qe8+ Kd5 60. Qee5#) 43. Kd4 Kg3 44. c5 Kxh3 45. c6 Kxg4 46. c7 Kf3 (46... Kf4 {is not the saving move} 47. c8=Q g4 48. Qf8+ Kg5 49. Ke5 Kh4 50. Qxg7 Kg3 51. Ke4 Kh3 52. Kf4 Kg2 53. Qb2+ Kf1 54. Kg3 Ke1 55. Qc2 Kf1 56. Qd1#) 47. c8=Q g4 (47... Kf4 {cannot change destiny
} 48. Qf8+ Kg3 49. Ke3 Kg4 50. Qf7 Kg3 51. Qxg7 g4 52. Qg5 Kg2 53. Qxg4+ Kf1 54. Qg5 Ke1 55. Qg1#) 48. Qf5+ Kg3 (48... Ke2 {does not improve anything} 49. Qxg4+ Kf2 50. Ke4 g6 51. Qxg6 Ke1 52. Qg2 Kd1 53. Kd3 Kc1 54. Qc2#) 49. Ke3 *

1-0
My Score
3/8 pts.: Win: 1 (Rd. 7); Draws: 2 (Rds. 2 & 6); Losses: 4 (Rds. 1, 3, 4 & 8); Director`s 1 pt. Bye: 1 (Rd. 5).
My Opponents' & My Scores
5/8 pts. - Maximo Alcantra Jr. (1726 – 3^rd seed) – I drew in Rd. 2.
4.5/8 pts. – Abderaouf Sekki (1740 – 2^nd seed) – I lost in Rd. 1.
4/8 pts. - Guy Brunet (1578 ) – I lost in Rd. 8.

• Mario Belanger (1571) – I won in Rd. 7.

3.5/8 pts. - Junior Boy Deren Mai (1523) – I lost in Rd. 3
3/8 pts. – Me (1633)

• Aldo Lelievre (1523) – I lost in Rd. 4.

2.5/8 pts. - Francis Malloy (1513) – I drew in Rd. 6.
Other Less Important Sections – Open
If I have time, I also report very minimally on the Open Section (Though I know all class players in Quebec & the Rest of Canada really are most interested in the U 1800 section!)
Leaders:5
1^st– 7/8 pts. - GM Reynaldo Vera Gonzalez-Quevedo (2424 – Cuba).
2^nd/5^th - 5.5/7 pts. – GM Bator Sambuev (2503 – Quebec, Canada); GM Alexandre Le Siege (2500 – Quebec, Canada); GM Thomas Roussel-Roozmon (2463 – Quebec, Canada); WIM Junior Girl Maili-Jade Ouellet (2079).
Favourites/Dark Horses (Non-leaders): 11
5.5/8 pts. - FM Olivier-Kenta Chiku-Ratte (2364); GM Luis Manuel Perez Rodriguez (2348 - Cuba).
5/7 pts. - IM David Cummings (2340); Shawn Rodrigue-Lemieux (2257); Dario Leonel Martinez Mulet (2123); CM Taira Tyler Tanaka ((2109); Ananda Saha (2059).
4.5/7 pts. – IM Raymond Kaufman (2301); Hughes Masse ((2168); Valentin Prahov (2055); Woman Player WFM Alexandra Botez (2040).
Full Results
See Chess-Results website (Canada): http://chess-results.com/fed.aspx?lan=1&fed=CAN
TEMPLATE BEGINS
Bob's Blog – Some History
For a number of years now, I have been posting my chess blog:
i) on my personal Facebook Account for my almost 850 Fb friends from around the world (in English): https://www.facebook.com/bob.armstrong.9235;
ii) sometimes on the national Canadian English chess discussion board, Chess Talk [CT] (https://forum.chesstalk.com/…/chesstalk-canada-s-chess-disc…);
iii) occasionally on other chess websites, such as that of FQE (Province of Quebec's Chess Association). That time the blog was posted in both French and English.
More recently I also have been "re-posting" my Fb blog:
i) on my Fb chess discussion group, Chess Chat - A Project of Chess Companions of Caissa (https://www.facebook.com/groups/340524269771672/);
ii) my Scarborough CC tournaments Fb Blog to SCC's Fb Page (URL above)
iii) my Annex CC tournaments Fb blog to ACC's Fb Group (https://www.facebook.com/groups/172335039452033/);
Henry Lam (Aka Dark Knight), the recently new owner of CT, and I have an agreement (From the summer of 2018) that I will re-post my Fb Blogs on CT for both my chess club official tournaments, and my non-club weekend (Sometimes longer; sometimes shorter) tournaments, in which I play between Summer 2018 and Summer 2019.
After that, Henry and I can then renew our agreement for another year if we both so wish.
So, under this agreement, most recently I have been re-posting my current Scarborough CC and Annex CC tournaments. My future non-club weekend blogs to and including Summer 2019 will be (Given my current schedule - from time to time, though, my life schedule may change so that I fit in a tournament not on my schedule):
1. The 2018 Hart House Holidays Open – Toronto (Prior to Christmas - Dec. 14-16/18) - Blogged;
2. The 2019 Hart House Reading Week Open – Toronto (February 16-18 – Only one short blog – having manic phase).
3. The 2019 Quebec Open – Longueuil (Next to Montreal) (July 21-7).
4. The 2019 Toronto Open (Aug. 31 – Sept. 2)

The Blog Focus
I mainly focus on the section I am playing in (Has been U 2000, U 1900 or U 1800). I feel that these class sections are often not covered by chess media, and yet, the bulk of chess tournament players are in the classes under 1900. And many of my class viewers have actually played players about whom I am blogging (Ones I play and ones with whom I may socialize during the tournament, who then are mentioned in the Blog). So this adds a bit more interest for them.
I do also generally cover (Bare Bones) the top section standings; but I have to have been able to get the results before the Blog goes to press. I sometimes will cover also the lower sections, if I have the results. For both, of course, it can be a matter of the time available (I am often doing my Blog in the wee hours of the morning).
I do hope my blogs will continue to provide a window onto class tournament chess, and what THIS chess player does in the day of club tournaments, and before and between rounds for weekend tournaments (A bit of a reality show - bits of my personal life).
I know many other chess players approach tournaments quite differently than I do (E.g. - study!), and so one cannot generalize from what I do.
Blog Feedback
Over the years, and in these more recent blogs, I have had generally positive feedback on my blogging, on both of my own Fb Accounts, the SCC & ACC Fb sites, and on CT.
It has been said that my writing style is easy to read, factual, and often entertaining. It is a find for all us "nosy" chess players!
Thanks to all those who have supported my Blogging on various sites, and kept encouraging me to continue.
TEMPLATE ENDS
Invitation
I am most happy to interact with readers re anything about which I have posted.....so react, comment, reply, post, etc. - both favourable comments and constructive criticism....I will do my best to respond to everyone, so long as I am where I have access to the internet.

So jump in with both feet, and we'll all enjoy the blogging adventure!
Bob A

[Bob Armstrong]

COQ/Quebec Open Chess Championship (Saturday, July 20 – Sat., July 27/19) - Blog

Rd. 9 (Final) – Saturday, 19/7/27 (10:00 AM)

Bob's Chess Blog # 8 (Part I of 3 parts)
(See Knight Logo below)

Tournament

Name: Championnat ouvert d’echecs du Quebec (COQ)/Quebec Open Chess Championship
Dates: July 20 – 27/19
Rounds: 9
Sections: 5: Open (Any level player); U 2000; U 1800; \U 1600; U 1400.
Registrations: 188 registrants: Open: 52; U 2000: 37; U 1800: 32; U 1600 - 30; U 1400: 37
Playing Up: In Quebec, all sections are truly “open” – you can play as long as you are not at or over the ceiling rating; no playing up fee.
Time Control: 40/90 + 30 (30 sec. increment from move 1)

Blog Note:

This Blog, here on my personal Facebook page, is directly re-posted a few other places - so references here refer to this Fb platform.

The Day of Rd. 9 - Final (Saturday, 19/7/27)

I`ve been here at the Sandman Hotel (Tournament location), in Longueuil, Quebec, since 4:30 PM, Friday, July 19. This past week has passed so quickly, and happily, that it is just a blur. I am sharing the room with my Toronto friend, Mario Moran-Venegas (U 2000 section ).

I is not unusual for me in weekend and longer tournaments, to sleep short and erratically (I have to be careful; sleep deficit and Bi-Polar Disorder do not go well together). But today I awoke at 5:00 AM (Went to bed this morning at 1:30 AM!). After midnight, Mario was entering our games, we had something to eat, and I did some preliminary packing.

So I dressed, and finished my packing – everything ready to go down to the car later this morning before checking out. Then I went looking for a dark roast…..nope…….Samedi….Tim`s at 7:00 AM; McDonalds not until 6:30, and it was only 6:00 AM. I might as well just go to my office down on the main floor of the hotel. I`ll try again in about ½ hr.

Then I settled into:

1. finishing and posting the Friday Blog # 7. Friday night I got the results of the Rd. 8 that I needed for this Friday Blog #7 from the results sheet in the hall… for both the U 1800 section and the Open section – the two I report on.
2. Entered into my normal daily routine (See Template below).

About 6:30 PM, I went out briefly to finally get my dark roast fix.

Then I returned to `work`.

Template Note:

There are sections of this blog that are a standard “template” which I repeat in each Blog.

The template must be here for any new readers of my Blog.

So I ask my regular readers to be tolerant. If you have read the template part previously, you can skip from “Template Begins” to “Template Ends” (I will alert you immediately after the template if there are any revisions you missed).

Continuing Saturday Morning

The regular readers of my blog (I’ve been doing this since the mid-2000’s) will be familiar with my normal morning routine that I would go through, which I already referred to above. I`ve left the template below as if I was in my office in our Toronto home, though this morning I`m, as usual this week, working in the Hotel Sandman Business Centre.

TEMPLATE BEGINS

Victim of Routine

As usual, I then went to my home office ((I am retired + unemployed – life is fine except for my slave-driver company, Canadian Life Consulting Cooperative [Quite a mouthful, but simply put: CLCC], where I must volunteer my work time for free all day long, 24/7!); and fired up my old laptop.

My Daily Personal Project Tasks

1. Check for my e-mails and Fb messages.
2. Check new posts/comments on ChessTalk (CT);
3. Check my Twitter feed to see what had been happening in the world (I follow numerous mainstream media from countries around the world, such as CBC, Toronto Star, National Post, NBC, The New York Times, The Washington Post, France 24, China Daily, Al Jezeera (English), Japan Times, Sputnik News, The Guardian, etc.). I post the most relevant...see below.
4. Fb Project # 1 (My Company's) - My little company (Not legally registered yet) is called, as said above, Canadian Life Consulting Cooperative (CLCC). So I update my company's Fb page, Canadian Life Consulting (CLC) - https://www.facebook.com/Canadian-Life-Consulting-16406543…/. I do this by checking my Twitter inbox for articles to re-post onto CLC. I then also check my Fb newsfeed and some of my Fb friends timelines for posts to "share".
5. Update one of the discussion groups formed under my company page, called Canadian Life Consulting Cooperative Supporters' Group (Or CLCC Supporters) - https://www.facebook.com/groups/2042495809374373/. I update it by sharing some more discussable of the posts now on the CLC page.
6. Fb Project # 2 (My Own): Update this Fb world events/politics discussion group that I have created here on my own personal Fb account, called PEERS (A Discussion Club of Equals) – https://www.facebook.com/bob.armstrong.9235. I do this by also sharing some of the CLC page posts. But I also share some of my sources' posts directly to this discussion club.
7. I share at least one chess post per day to my Fb chess discussion club, Chess Chat, formed under my personal Fb account - https://www.facebook.com/groups/340524269771672/.
8. When I find them, I share discussable religious posts to my World Religions discussion club Fb Group, Theist Community - https://www.facebook.com/groups/1052227598173591/.
Sometimes these also appear in PEERS.
9. I have another retiree project besides my 2 Facebook Projects.
Chess is a passionate hobby of mine, as you know. But I have never really studied seriously.
But what I do is I enter all my games, and annotate them, to try to learn something - Grandmasters do recommend this often. In addition, I integrate the opening (the first 10 moves) into an opening/defence tree I have for the opening/defence played. The value of this is pretty uncertain, given my inability to remember lines - but I do develop general impressions of how the opening can go.

So on my own time, I go back and forth between the 2 Facebook projects and my chess hobby project.

My 35/25 System

As well, I go back and forth between my routine items above and my own personal life tasks to be done that day. But I have a somewhat unique system for doing this.

Recently I found that I was spending a lot more time on my three retiree projects than my normal life tasks - don't we all spend more time on what we enjoy!

But I was falling behind in "life" while keeping up in the "Fb/chess" projects. So I did have to deal with this issue.
So I came up with the "35/25 System". What this is:

When I am at home, I bite the bullet and I spend 35 min. on my life tasks, which I think of as “working for myself”; I even set the alarm! Then I reward myself with 25 min. on my 3 retiree projects (Facebook [2] & Chess). I try very hard to religiously stop when I am to change phases.

This has actually worked out well....I am still abysmally behind in "Life", but not nearly as much as I used to be! LOL

TEMPLATE ENDS

(See Parts II & III below)

Bob A